Duterte enjoins appointees to serve, protect people
President Duterte has urged new appointees in government to serve and protect the people well. The President reminded the latest batch of presidential appointees about being “workers of government” during the mass oath-taking ceremony in Malacañang last Tuesday.
“My only message to you is that we are all workers of government and so let us work to preserve the nation and to protect the people,” Duterte said during the closed-door Palace event.
Forty-nine newly appointed officials composed mostly of judges and state prosecutors were sworn into office during the Palace event.
In a separate ceremony, Chief Justice Lucas Bersamin took his oath before the President as the country's 25th top magistrate a week after his appointment.
Bersamin, who has been in the judiciary for more than three decades, was accompanied by his family to the historic event.
Bersamin, who began as a Regional Trial Court judge of Quezon City in 1986, replaced Teresita De Castro who retired from government service last October.
He will reach the mandatory retirement age of 70 in October 2019.
The President also administered the oath of Supreme Court Associate Justice Ramon Paul Hernando and Associate Justice Rosmari Carandang at the Palace Tuesday.
Among the new presidential appointees are Presidential Communications Operations Office Undersecretary Raquel Tobias, Civil Service Commissioner Aileen Lourdes Abella Lizada, National Anti-Poverty Commission lead convenor Noel Felongco, and Presidential Commission for the Urban Poor chair Alvin Feliciano.