AS the one-year appointment ban on those who ran in the May 2022 elections lapsed, lawmakers urged President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to resist the temptation of appointing or recycling candidates who lost in the last elections and Cabinet secretaries with no plans to run for office in 2025.
Cagayan de Oro City 2nd District Rep. Rufus Rodriguez and Minority Leader Marcelino Libanan, in separate statements, made the appeal as the one-year ban on the appointment of election losers expired.
According to Rodriguez, if the President now fills vacant Cabinet jobs, âit should not be because of the lapse of the one-year appointment ban but because there is real need for full-time Cabinet members, including one at the Department of Agriculture, which is temporarily headed by the Chief Executive himself.â
âI have nothing against election losers, but [the] Cabinet and other government jobs should not be a refuge of political has-beens. There are many deserving and competent career service officers and individuals from the private sector with vast experiences,â he said.
He added that the President should stop the practice of recycling âor rewarding defeated candidates with government positions.â
Among the departments that are in need of full-time permanent secretaries are those of agriculture, health and national defense.
In the case of the Department of Agriculture, Rodriguez said the President should give way to a full-time secretary âbecause he has his hands already full in international relations and immediate domestic needs and problems of the country, including rising tensions in the West Philippine Sea.â
âI would recommend that the next agriculture secretary be from Mindanao, the island being the Philippinesâs breadbasket. It is also high time to transfer the DA central office to Mindanao where our countryâs agricultural battle ground is set,â he said.
âHe should have competent people helping him. He is very fortunate that he has his principal ally in Congress, our Speaker Martin Romualdez, to rely on not only in terms of legislative and moral support but in solving problems the nation faces,â he added.
For his part, Libanan said the President should preferably pick new department secretaries who are ready to serve for the next five years.
âOur suggestion is for the President to appoint highly capable department heads who can focus entirely on their jobs until 2028, and who do not have any plans to run in the 2025 elections, which is just 24 months away,â Libanan said.
âSecretaries keen on running for office in the mid-term polls are bound to become preoccupied with partisan political activities in a matter of months,â Libanan added.
Last week, Marcos said he intends to reorganize his Cabinet soon, as he wants to appoint new members, including individuals who lost in the last elections, following the lapse of the 12-month prohibition on their appointment.
Libanan said there is nothing wrong with the Presidentâs plan to tap individuals who ran and lost in the May 2022 elections.
âAs long as they are highly qualified and competent individuals, it does not matter if they lost in the previous elections, considering that the ban has already expired,â Libanan said.
Libanan urged the President to designate permanent heads for the Department of Agriculture (DA), Department of Health (DOH), and the Department of National Defense (DND).
The President concurrently heads the DA, while Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire and Senior Undersecretary Carlito Galvez Jr. serve as officers-in-charge of the DOH and the DND, respectively.