DND, MILITARY IN UNUSUAL FIX DUE TO VACANT TOP-TIER POSTS
It has been a year since the officer in charge of the Department of National Defense (DND), Undersecretary Jose Faustino Jr., retired from the military service, ending an appointment ban on retired military officials, but Malacañang still has no word if he would be named fulltime defense secretary.
“We are still waiting for news from the Office of the President,” defense spokesperson Arsenio Andolong told reporters on Thursday.
Faustino, the 10th Armed Forces of the Philippines chief under former President Rodrigo Duterte, retired as head of the military organization on Nov. 12 last year, when he reached the mandatory retirement age of 56 and after a brief stint as AFP boss of a little over three months.
President Marcos actually named Faustino as defense secretary in June. But due
to a yearlong appointment ban on retired military officials, he would only serve as senior undersecretary and DND officer in charge before becoming secretary.
“Faustino is being tapped as senior undersecretary and officer in charge of the Department of National Defense, a post he would later assume as secretary on Nov. 13, 2022, in compliance with the one-year ban on the appointment of retired military officers under Republic Act No. 6975,” the Marcos camp had said in June.
The yearlong ban for Faustino lapsed during the weekend, but there was no announcement from the Office of the President on whether he would be retained and take the position of secretary of national defense, which would require a separate appointment paper.
Floating status
The AFP itself has been grappling with an unprecedented situation over its leadership.
Months since he assumed office in August, AFP chief of staff Lt. Gen. Bartolome Vicente Bacarro could not yet earn his four-star rank, which is reserved for his position.
The reason is that his predecessor, Gen. Andres Centino, who was supposed to retire in February next year, remains in active service.
Centino was recently nominated as ambassador to India after the President decided not to retain him as AFP chief. But he remained on floating status even after he stepped down as AFP chief, making the four-star rank unavailable to Bacarro.
“He is considered for an ambassadorial post and he will be considered retired if he gets it. The four-star rank is still with him. When he retires immediately after his appointment, then General Bacarro will get it (the fourth star),” Faustino said, without explaining why Centino has not let go of his rank even if he was not retained by Mr. Marcos.
The Marcos camp had said in August that Centino would be appointed to a new position “befitting a former chief of staff.”
When Bacarro took the helm of the AFP on Aug. 8, the position he emptied at the Southern Luzon Command, which oversees operations in Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal and Quezon), Mimaropa (Mindoro, Marinduque and Romblon, except Palawan) and Bicol region, was filled in by a one-star general in an acting position.
Under the Republic Act No. 11709, the new law which sets the fixed terms for senior officials occupying key positions, Bacarro is the first chief of staff who will serve under a fixed term of three years, even if he turned 56 this year. The law was signed by former President Rodrigo Duterte in April and took effect on July 1.
Delays upstairs
Appointments in at least four key positions in the AFP— vice chief of staff, Navy flag officer in command, and commanders of the Southern Luzon and Western Mindanao Commands—have also been facing delays while the new law setting the fixed terms for senior officials occupying key positions is being sorted out.
On Sept. 9, AFP vice chief of staff Lt. Gen. Erickson Gloria and Navy chief Vice Adm. Adeluis Bordado, retired from the military service without regularly appointed successors.
On Oct. 4, Lt. Gen. Alfredo Rosario, head of the Western Mindanao Command—the unit that goes after local terror groups in the region—bowed out of service without an immediate replacement.
Some military officers have been lukewarm toward the new law due to uncertainties it brings in their promotions, but Faustino said “the improved IRR (implementing rules and regulations) somehow mitigated these unintended consequences (of the new law).”
The IRR was meant to clarify the details of the new law.
Faustino said they have been trying to explain the new law to military personnel whenever they visited field units to address their concerns.
The AFP had said that the new law prescribing fixed threeyear terms for key positions would end the culture of revolving door policy in the AFP.
“This ensures that only the best officers ascend the ladder of leadership. This also puts an end to the revolving door system in the AFP leadership that resulted from the retirement law passed in 1979,” then Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said when the law was passed in April.
Marcos’ predecessors Duterte and Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo had 11 AFP chiefs, while Benigno Aquino III had seven.