President Rodrigo Duterte’s attacks on state auditors mean that the Commission on Audit (COA) has “effectively and truthfully carried out” its duty, said former COA Commissioner Heidi Mendoza, now undersecretary general for the United Nations Office of Internal Oversight.

Months after telling a governor to push a COA auditor down the stairs for the agency’s “stupid circulars,” the President now wants to kidnap and torture COA auditors.

The President made the threat against state auditors at the Barangay Summit on Peace and Order in Pasay City on Tuesday night.

In a social media post on Wednesday, Mendoza compared auditors with “actors who are antagonists in the movies” and who have to be effective for viewers to hate the characters being portrayed.

But she said auditors didn’t intend to interfere in government affairs, slow down transactions and hinder opportunities to earn revenue.

“Our role is to give chance to make the use of the country’s money more proper, better and more orderly in a way that is accountable and open to criticism by every citizen or people who care,” said Mendoza, who had testified in congressional hearings in the country about corruption in the military. 

President Rodrigo Duterte defended the Department of Health (DOH) from allegations that the recent Commission on Audit (COA) report on unmaximized billions worth of funds pointed to corruption.

"To the issue of whether money has been stolen, that is pure bullshit," said Duterte on Monday, August 16, during his weekly pandemic public address.


"Imposible magnakaw ka ng P67.3 [billion] (It's impossible for someone to steal P67.3 billion)," he also said.


The President also refused to fire Health Secretary Francisco Duque III. He said he expected Duque to submit his resignation after that meeting but that he would reject it outright.


"Wala ka namang ginawang masama, bakit ka mag resign? (You didn't do anything wrong, so why resign?), said Duterte, after saying COA reports are "not fair" to officials like Duque.

The President downplayed the COA findings, insisting they only point to missing paperwork and not to outright corruption. The COA has said as much but groups have called for a deeper investigation into how the funds were handled.

‘Who’s from COA here?’

The President first attacked state auditors in remarks made in Laoag City on Sept. 16 last year after he heard Ilocos Norte Gov. Imee Marcos’ complaints against COA rules on cash advances to purchase materials for rebuilding homes after a typhoon.

The President told local officials to defy the audit agency’s “stupid circulars.”

“Who’s from COA here? Push him down the stairs so he won’t report anymore,” he then said, berating the commission for contributing nothing to national development.

The President said he didn’t care about COA circulars since these were not laws.

Reacting to the President’s statement, COA Chair Michael Aguinaldo on Oct. 1 quipped: “I just told the auditors, avoid the stairs.”

It was the COA that exposed the alleged conflict of interest in the advertising transactions entered into by former Tourism Secretary Wanda Tulfo-Teo with state-run People’s Television Network.

The commission also reported the Davao City government’s continued failure to clean up its payroll of questionable contractual employees for the past three years since COA uncovered dubious hiring practices.