There is one thing that most Filipinos agree on these days: They find no reason why Sara Zimmerman Duterte Carpio is still the vice president of this Republic. Her behavior at the congressional hearing on the budget of the Office of the Vice President (OVP) this week showed she was not only insolent but also rude. Worse, her refusal to defend her budget smacks of arrogance, and she did so by simply telling that Congress can do whatever it wants with the OVP appropriation.
If she cannot defend the OVP budget and must rely on responses relayed on her cellular phone before she can answer questions, then she has no business heading the OVP. One curious theory that she posits is that she needs a “command center,” which should be adequately funded. The only command center in this country is in Malacanang and is not at the OVP. Only political rubes believe that she is entitled to wield as much power as the tenant at the Palace. Only those rubes benefit from their proximity to this non-performing asset of the Marcos Jr. administration.
The way she snarled at ACT Teachers Rep. France Castro and Kabataan Rep. Raoul Manuel during the hearing betrayed that something is wrong with her. For her, it is a “take-it-or-leave-it-matter” as doesn’t want to entertain any query. Give me the money or I’ll scream. Castro, who has been clashing with Sara since 2022, noted that the vice president was using squid tactics to evade responding to her questions. She discharges ink to muddle issues, making it impossible to clarify what needs to be clarified. Thus, Sara is now known notoriously as “Tita Pusit” while Filipinos in Canada call her “Princess Fiona,” after the villainous character in “Shrek.” She wanted no questions asked about how she wasted P221.424 million in December 2022. The Commission on Audit (COA) found out that the money was used for “surveillance” in 132 areas, while P73-million was for the payment of “rewards” and purchases of computers and other equipment, which COA immediately disallowed.
“Harapang pagkagarapal ni VP Pusit ang paghuhurumentado sa hearing sa Kamara para pagtakpan ang malawakan niyang paglustay sa pondo ng bayan. Aanhin ng taumbayan ang surveillance, safe house at kung anuman itong ‘various goods’ na sinasabi niya? Imbis na pondo sa kapakanan ng bayan, kinukurakot at ginagamit pa sa karahasan!” KMU secretary general Jerome Adonis argued. Earlier, Sara maintained the money was spent for transport fares of people from Mindanao stranded in Manila, including scholars, burial expenses and financial assistance to those who sought her help. The P125 million in confidential funds could have built 63 public school classrooms at 2 million each. Adonis also bewailed the fact that the proposed 2025 national budget also has P2.06-trillion in presidential pork barrel stashed in infrastructure, confidential and intelligence funds (CIFs) and in special programmed funds and unprogrammed appropriations. Adonis called for Sara’s ouster, heeding the call of Castro and former Sen. Leila de Lima.
In 2022, the OVP budget was approved in 7 minutes, despite the objection of the minority. In the same year, Sara asked Malacanang to increase her DepEd budget by P100-billion on top of the P710 allotted to the department “to solve all the problems of DepEd.” The problems worsened with her at the helm, prompting her to quit on June 19, 2024. The boast went bust for Tita Pusit aka Princess Fiona. Now, the OVP budget will be tackled on Sept. 10 after the panel deliberating on the budget unanimously approved to freeze the OVP appropriation. Sara reaped what she sowed and she lost Quimbo as her defender while Rep. Zia Alonto Adiong wondered if he could still convince the panel to approve it. The knives are out and the diligent lawmakers are ready to strip the OVP of its dripping grease.
Sara had wanted her nemesis, Castro to be ousted from the panel, earning hoots from observers who noted that it is the first time in the history of the House of Representatives that a resource person had demanded that a committee member be replaced, along with the presiding officer. At the Senate, Sara also sparred with Sen. Risa Hontiveros for asking her about the “Isang Kaibigan” picture book that she “authored” and for which the OVP would spend P10-million. The book is very similar to the second book in the Owly series of US author Andy Runton, from the generous bird who helps another bird build a nest. Nocturnal owls build nets on the crevices of trees, not the branches, and they tell their stories at night, not on a dark noon of Arthur Koestler. Sara’s red-tagging extends to the Lower House and her target is Castro, who was convicted falsely for child abuse by a court that didn’t hear her defense or consider evidence submitted by her counsel.
Sara also asked that Marikina Rep. Stella Quimbo be replaced as hearing officer. Quimbo was the same congresswoman who told reporters last year that there was an appropriation for confidential intelligence fund (CIF) for the OVP “kaya lang zero ang nakalagay.” Sara should have credited Quimbo for such wisdom but no, she wanted her out since the proceedings became political theater for those who were out to clarify issues and point to the vice president that there was no such committee on finance at the Lower House, and that she was a resource person who does not set the rules for the lawmakers to follow. Sara proved she doesn’t know legislative rules and the processes followed by the appropriations subcommittee, or the generally accepted Robert’s Rules for parliaments and assemblies.
Whoever thought that they can inflict this woman on the Filipino people as an official a heartbeat away from the presidency should admit that they wronged the electorate. Moreover, the cut-and-paste Team Unity tandem failed to analyze that after the rudest Rody Duterte made a mess of the presidency from 2016 to 2022, they reserved a place for the rudest Sara to insult Filipinos some more from 2022 to 2028. The Filipino people should wake up from their slumber and see Sara for what she really: Totally unfit as vice president and completely disqualified from running in the 2028 presidential race. The Filipino people should issue their own quo warranto writ to Sara this early to compel her to show under what authority she exercises her right to hold the OVP. Which brings all of us back to the issue of digital cheating in the 2022 elections.
