Is ‘Piattos’ for real? House questions OVP fund recipient

MANILA, Philippines — Lawmakers at the House of Representatives, hungry for answers on how Vice President Sara Duterte spent P125 million of her office’s confidential funds, have chipped in P1 million from their pockets as a cash reward for anyone who could produce “Mary Grace Piattos,” an alleged recipient of part of that fund spent in just 11 days in December 2022.

Piattos’ alleged first names resemble that of a restaurant chain and her alleged surname, that of a chips brand.

That full name was among the signatories in the more than 1,200 deficient acknowledgment receipts which the Office of the Vice President (OVP) had submitted to the Commission on Audit (COA) to try to justify its P125-million expenditure.

READ: COA: OVP sent deficient receipts on secret funds

The COA had also noted that the amounts corresponding to the deficient receipts were among the P73 million that it had disallowed out of the 2022 confidential funds.

Questionable receipts

Antipolo City Rep. Romeo Acop, who questioned Piattos’ identity at a Nov. 5 hearing by the House committee on good government and public accountability, said her acknowledgment receipt was among 787 others also submitted to the COA that bore only signatures and no names, or vice versa, and 302 receipts with unreadable or questionable names.

Other documents bore names similar to snack brands such as “Nova,” “Oishi” and “Tempura.” A handful of them only had initials such as “AAS” and “JOV.”

For his part, 1-Rider Rep. Ramon Rodrigo Gutierrez cited 158 acknowledgment receipts for some P23.8 million in payments bearing erroneous dates in December 2023 instead of December 2022.

Lawyer Gloria Camora of the COA’s Intelligence and Confidential Funds Audit Office said the deficient receipts were intended to justify a broad range of expenses including supplies, equipment and food aid, as well as the “purchase of information” and “rewards, including medicine.”

She pointed out that due to their discrepancies with their corresponding receipts, the payments were included in the COA’s notice of disallowance for the P73 million.

Real person?

In a press conference on Monday, Assistant Majority Leader Jefferson Khonghun, vice chair of the House counterpart to the Senate blue ribbon committee, said members of the panel as well as the House quad committee had agreed to chip in the cash reward “in our desire to [conclude] the committee’s hearing.”

The Zambales lawmaker said it was crucial to identify the supposed recipients of the OVP’s confidential funds.

“[That’s why] it’s very important that the signatories in the acknowledgment receipts attend the hearing and one of them is Mary Grace Piattos,” Khonghun said. “We really want to find out if Mary Grace Piattos is real because the OVP is insisting she is [a] real person… At least we can put [the issue] to rest because we don’t believe that Mary Grace Piattos is a real person and they’re saying she is.”

As to why the cash reward is being put up only for Piattos, the lawmaker said, “If there is no Mary Grace Piattos, it’s a certainty that all other [signatories are] fictitious.”