President Duterte is not inclined to give Vice President Leni G. Robredo another Cabinet post.
“At this time, I am not considering,” Duterte said during a television interview yesterday when asked if she will offer another Cabinet post to Robredo after she voluntarily stepped down as chairperson of the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council.
According to the President, he was actually being generous when he appointed Robredo to head the housing agency last July.
“There are many people who were saying: “Why not include her in the Cabinet so she can be more productive?” said Duterte. “I went out of my way.”
The arrangement became a problem, the President said, when the Vice President started going out on the streets to attend “Oust Duterte” rallies.
“The following day she is there in front of me during Cabinet meetings,” Duterte said. “You are there during the meetings but you are part of the crowd who says they want me out. It’s the height of incongruity.”
“Her ouster from the Cabinet from that time on became a fait accompli,” the Chief Executive added.
Robredo announced her resignation as HUDCC chairperson after receiving a text message from Cabinet Secretary Jun Evasco that Duterte wanted her to “desist from attending all Cabinet meetings starting Monday, December 5.”
The Vice President cited “major differences” between her and the President “in principles and values.”
According to Robredo, since she assumed office, she has been consistent in her opposition to issues such as the “burial of former President Ferdinand Marcos in the Li-bingan ng mga Bayani, extra-judicial killings, reinstating death penalty, lowering the age of criminal liability, and sexual attacks against women.”
“But we both had a mandate to serve the people,” she said in her statement. “I had hoped that this shared commitment to the poor and marginalized would transcend the differences between us. So, I took the job of Housing Secretary when it was offered to me.” (Roy C. Mabasa)