SOS Network urges VP Sara: Explain confidential fund spending

Vice President Sara Duterte

DAVAO CITY, Philippines — The Save Our Schools (SOS) Network, which supports Lumad schools in Mindanao, has called on Vice President Sara Duterte to explain her use of confidential funds instead of focusing on a complaint against ACT Teachers Partylist Rep. France Castro.

“Where is the P125 million in confidential funds allegedly spent in just 11 days? What happened to the more than P500 million in total public funds entrusted to her office?” the SOS Network conveners asked Duterte in a statement on Sunday.

The group also asked the House to launch an investigation into a recent shooting in Makati involving police officers and Castro while the latter was aboard her vehicle.

The SOS Network is led by Prof. Marion Tan, former vice chancellor of the University of the Philippines in Diliman; Mae Fe Ancheta-Templa, former Undersecretary of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) and Prof. Sofia G. Guillermo, a faculty member at UP Diliman.

They also wanted to know who Mary Grace Piattos was and where could she be found.

READ: OVP spent over P375M in confidential funds in 2023 – COA

According to the group, Duterte’s ethics complaint against Castro was a ploy to distract the Filipino people from critical questions about how she used her confidential funds.

Last Dec. 10, a group of indigenous people leaders filed a complaint against Castro before the House committee on ethics for allegedly endangering 14 lumad children in 2018, a case which is still currently on appeal.

SOS Network pointed out that Duterte had enlisted the services of the lawyer of Pastor Apollo Quiboloy, who is facing multiple charges of child trafficking, abuse, and rape filed by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation.

“Associating herself with such figures reflects a deep ethical void in her leadership and reinforces the Duterte legacy of impunity and moral decay,” the group said.

“On the other hand, the Dutertes’ usual pawns in their fascist attacks are indigenous paramilitaries who have led massacres and other human rights violations in Lumad villages. They misrepresent themselves as innocent indigenous villagers who are falsely asserting their right to self-determination.”

“This is a disturbing turn of events in the move to impeach Sara Duterte,” the group said.

“Context is important in this case. Where a sitting vice president had vowed to assassinate President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., it is not far-fetched that lesser political mortals are standing on Duterte’s warpath. Afterall, the investigations led by the House Quad Committee and by Sen. Risa Hontiveros have painted the image of the Duterte family as a mafia syndicate surrounded by extrajudicial killers.”