Photo credit: Congress PH

A lawmaker is raising fresh concerns over billions of pesos in financial transactions linked to Vice President Sara Duterte, saying her own camp’s explanation may have only strengthened questions about accountability.

Terry Ridon, chair of the House Committee on Public Accounts, said the issue boils down to three simple questions: how much money moved, where it came from, and where it went.

Ridon made the statement in response to remarks from Duterte spokesperson Michael Poa, who argued that figures reported by the Anti-Money Laundering Council should be viewed with caution. Poa said the numbers reflect accumulated transactions over nearly two decades—not the actual remaining balances in bank accounts.

But for Ridon, that defense does not weaken the issue—it sharpens it.

“If the figures are not false, then the billions that passed through the accounts are real,” he said. “And if that scale of financial activity cannot be explained, it raises serious questions of unexplained wealth and even betrayal of public trust.”

Ridon stressed that the concern is not about accounting formats or whether totals match year-end balances, but the sheer volume of transactions and the lack of clarity surrounding them.

“This is about billions moving through accounts without clear sources and destinations—that’s the core issue of accountability,” he said.

He pointed to records presented during a recent hearing of the House Committee on Justice, where the Office of the Ombudsman showed Duterte’s Statements of Assets, Liabilities, and Net Worth (SALN) from 2007 to 2024. These documents reflected an increase in declared net worth from ₱7.25 million to ₱88.51 million.

In the same hearing, the Anti-Money Laundering Council reported ₱6.77 billion in covered and suspicious transactions allegedly linked to Duterte and her husband, Manases Carpio.

Ridon said the gap between millions in declared wealth and billions in transactions cannot be dismissed as a simple misunderstanding.

“You can’t brush this off as a formatting issue,” he said. “When the difference is that large, the questions only grow stronger.”

He also rejected the argument that the figures are less concerning because they span 18 to 19 years.

“Even if you spread it out over time, the question doesn’t disappear,” Ridon said. “Even if the money just circulated, you still have to explain where it originally came from.”

According to Ridon, the issue ultimately comes down to whether the declared financial capacity matches the scale of activity reflected in official records.

“There’s a money trail, there are sworn declarations, and there’s a constitutional duty to disclose,” he said. “If those don’t align, then there are serious questions that need answers.”

Ridon also pushed back against what he described as attempts to deflect the issue.

“What we’re seeing is not clarification, but evasion,” he said. “You can’t expect the public to accept the explanation that these are ‘just total transactions’ without a clear accounting.”

He added that the proper venue for answering these questions is the impeachment process itself.

“Face the AMLC. Face the numbers. Face the documents,” Ridon said. “If there is an explanation, present it in a forum where there is accountability.”

In the end, Ridon said the issue is straightforward.

“No amount of wordplay can erase the documents. No spin can change the numbers.”