By HANNAH TORREGOZA
CONTROVERSIAL Presidential Communications Operations Office (PCOO) Assistant Secretary Mocha Uson has resigned.
The blogger and social media influencer chose to disclose her decision to step down from her post during a Senate hearing on the PCOO’s budget.
Uson, whose real name is Esther Margaux Justiniano Uson, said she has decided to resign to ensure that the agency’s budget can move on and be immediately approved by Congress, noticing that some lawmakers constantly delay deliberations on the PCOO budget because of her.
“Taon-taon ay sinasabihan ako na huwag punahin ang ilang mga mambabatas para hindi ipitin ang budget ng PCOO,” Uson said during the Senate finance committee hearing.
“Nakakagalit man ngunit ganyan ang sistema natin sa kasalukuyan. Bulok man ngunit ito kelangang sundin,” Uson told senators during the Senate finance committee hearing.
“Inisip ko pong manahimik sa harap ng pag-atake niyo dahil alam kong kaya ninyong ipitin ang budget ng aming departamento. Di na kayo nahiya sa ating pangulo na walang pagod sa kakatrabaho para isaayos ang ating bayan, samantalang kayong ilang mambabatas ay ginagamit ang position upang takutin ang mga ahensya ng gob-yerno na hindi sumasakay sa inyong panssariling agenda,” she said.
“At dahil dyan, ako na ang magsasakripisyo para maipasa na ang budget ng PCOO. Ako ay nagdesisyon nang mag-resign,” she emphasized.
However, Uson told her detractors her fight is not yet over saying she will bring her fight in the Senate and the House of Representatives.
“Para sa mga bumabatikos sa akin, huwag kayong magkakama-ling isipin na nagtagumay kayo. Hindi ako nagbitiw sa position dahil takot akong harapin kayo. Gusto ko lang na pag nagkaharap tayo patas ang laban” Uson said.
“Dadalhin ko ang laban sa Senado at sa Kongreso…Hindi po ito katapusan ng laban, umpisa pa lamang ito,” she stressed.
Senator Joseph Victor “JV” Ejercito, chair of the Senate finance sub-committee and tasked to defend the PCOO budget, accepted Uson’s pronouncement and thanked her for choosing the Senate as a venue to disclose her personal decision.
“Thank you for trusting the Senate, but as I said, public office is a public trust. It’s a thankless job, but I hope the past two years we have learned a lot of lessons, from our mistakes, we should learn from them,” Ejercito said.
In his opening statement, Ejercito emphasized that actions of government officials should be held to a higher standard “because of the power that you wield, in the case of Asec. Mocha, both as a social media blogger and as a public official.”
“The words that we say, the acts that we perform are held to a higher standard. Today, aside from tackling your proposed budget for 2019, we also expect that you could shed light to the controversies and issues. We want that at the end of this hearing, we can assure our people that the mandate of the PCOO is fulfilled and that your budget is efficiently utilized. We should uphold what our Constitution mandates – that public office is a public trust,” Ejercito said.
“This should be our guidance to be always mindful of our actions as public officials,” he said.
Uson has recently been dragged into various controversies, particularly for coming up with a lewd video of “pepederalismo” jingle with blogger-friend, Andrew Olivar, supposedly to raise awareness on the Duterte administration’s thrust for federalism.
