Manila: Presiding officer Francis 'Chiz' Escudero on Monday pointed to limitations in using Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) records to establish the identities of supposed confidential fund recipients, noting that the civil registry is not yet universal and that even an exact name match may not conclusively identify the actual payee.
According to Philippines News Agency, during Vice President Sara Duterte's impeachment trial, Escudero questioned Assistant National Statistician Marizza Grande on the scope and reliability of the Civil Registry System (CRS) after the prosecution presented PSA verification results on names appearing in acknowledgment receipts. Escudero highlighted the non-universality of the CRS, a point that Grande confirmed.
Escudero clarified that not all Filipinos who are alive, have died, or have married necessarily appear in the PSA database, to which Grande agreed as a fair characterization. He also pressed Grande on whether a 'single match' result in the database conclusively identified the individual named in questioned acknowledgment receipts. Grande acknowledged that a match did not necessarily mean the person in the PSA record was the same individual.
The discussion followed Escudero's establishment that the 63-percent no-record rate cited during the hearing was based solely on names submitted by the prosecution for PSA verification, rather than the entire set of acknowledgment receipts. Private prosecutor Mae Divinagracia noted some receipts were excluded due to unreadable names or signatures without corresponding names. She indicated the possibility of the 63-percent figure changing if all names were available for verification.
Escudero also pointed out that Congress has enacted laws allowing corrections to civil registry entries without court proceedings, acknowledging potential errors in records. He cited laws like Republic Acts 9048 and 10172 that permit amendments to civil registry documents through annotations. Grande mentioned that the PSA is developing an electronic civil registration and vital statistics system, which aims to link birth registration with the National ID system, potentially achieving a more comprehensive database within three to five years.
