Senate Minority Leader Alan Peter Cayetano on Wednesday cautioned against interpreting large cash withdrawals made by the Office of the Vice President (OVP) as evidence of criminality, emphasizing that unusual transactions are not inherently unlawful.
Speaking on the 10th day of Vice President Sara Duterte’s Senate impeachment trial, Cayetano stressed that high-value cash disbursements should not automatically trigger suspicion, given that government entities operate under vastly different funding needs.
“Just because it’s ‘unusual,’ it doesn’t mean it’s illegal or whatever,” Cayetano said in his interjection.
The senator-judge raised the argument while questioning retired Land Bank of the Philippines branch manager Violeta Constantino, who had earlier testified that the OVP’s cash withdrawals stood out as “unusual” compared to those of other state agencies.
To support his point, Cayetano cited his tenure as foreign affairs secretary, recalling an instance where millions of pesos had to be urgently withdrawn to assist stranded overseas Filipino workers following a major storm.
He noted that the transaction required special coordination because the local bank branch initially lacked sufficient cash reserves on hand.
He further drew a distinction between public and private banking operations, explaining that while banks apply strict “know your customer” protocols to investigate large private transactions, government accounts follow different operational realities.
“Pero pag government, as long as you’re dealing with the people you identified with… basta’t everything’s in order. Magtataka lang kapag sobrang laki nung amount. But then you’ll release it,” Cayetano noted.
The Senate impeachment court is currently examining evidence under Article I, which alleges that Duterte misused ₱612.5 million in confidential funds assigned to the OVP and the Department of Education.