Co-terminous

Effective yesterday, the election period in the country officially started and will culminate on May 9 when we hold our next national and local polls. During the election period, the Commission on Elections (Comelec) will implement the rules and regulations under the country’s Omnibus Election Code. Among them is the prohibition on the transfer of any official or employee in the civil service agencies and offices.

The Comelec, however, has allowed the Office of the President and other government agencies the “continuing authority” to hire, appoint, or transfer officers or employees during this election period.

In Resolution No.10030 issued by the Comelec last year, such authority had been granted also to the Supreme Court (SC); Court of Appeals (CA); the Sandiganbayan; the Court of Tax Appeals, and lower courts; the Senate and the Presidential Electoral Tribunals; the Philippine National Police (PNP) and the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP). But such authority is subject to prior written authority from the Comelec.

For the next 150 days of election period, it would be reasonable to expect Malacañang Palace will continue to install into office new presidential appointees being named during these last few days of the outgoing administration. As of today, President Aquino has 172 days left of his six-year term of office.

Only last week, President Aquino named his Palace deputy executive secretary Ronaldo Geron Jr. to become his new commissioner of the Bureau of Immigration (BI). Geron took over from commissioner Siegfred Mison who found himself unceremoniously replaced.

Mison’s ouster officially came out a day after a report of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) found him and 17 others liable for the repeated escapes of a South Korean detained at the BI. He was immediately replaced by Geron upon the recommendation of Department of Justice (DOJ) Secretary Benjamin Caguioa who exercises supervisory powers over attached agencies like the BI and the NBI.

Caguioa himself is just newly appointed in the Aquino Cabinet. The former  chief presidential legal counsel of Mr. Aquino was named in October last year as new DOJ chief. He replaced then Secretary Leila de Lima who resigned to run as one of the 12-man administration senatorial candidates in the May 2016 elections.

Caguioa’s confirmation as DOJ secretary remains pending at the Commission on Appointments (CA). His ad interim appointment at the CA was technically bypassed when the 16th Congress went on recess last Christmas. Sessions will resume on January 18.

While his confirmation hangs at the CA, Caguioa applied for the vacancy at the 15-man high court and went through the public interview last week by the Judicial and Bar Council. If he fails to get the SC post, Caguioa will continue as justice secretary for the remaining six months of the Aquino administration as a co-terminous official of the outgoing President.

Coffee shop talk, however, was rife with rumors that Caguioa has the inside track to get the seat of SC associate justice Martin Villarama who opted for early retirement for health reasons. In turn, DOJ’s newly appointed undersecretary, lawyer Emmanuel Caparas, who happens to be also a classmate of Mr. Aquino and Caguioa at the Ateneo de Manila from grade school to college (economics) is being groomed to become the new DOJ secretary.

At least, he gets to serve in the Aquino Cabinet until June 30 this year when the President’s six-year term ends, also as his co-terminous appointee.

A true foot soldier, Mison accepted his removal as BI chief obviously without any tinge of bitterness or regret. This I surmised from his personal notes he posted on his Facebook (FB) account last Friday when news of his being “sacked” as BI chief was headlined at The STAR:

“1669 days: For me, it was not just a job; it was a mission. And my mission was to leave the Bureau a little better than I found it. To all OPM (Ordinaryong Pilipino na may Malasakit) in BI, thank you very much. Together, ‘Mission ni Mison’ was accomplished with so much passion in line with ‘Tuwid Na Daan.’

“Bright new beginnings are often disguised as painful endings. Mabuhay Ang Pilipino! Mabuhay Ang Pilipinas!”

A few hours later, Mison posted anew at 4 p.m. on his FB status the same day an emoticon of a happy face with the tag line “feeling thankful” (with the name of a fitness center in Quezon City where he was) when he posted this: “Benefits of Unemployment: Workshop during supposed office hours.”

At the start of the new year, President Aquino has appointed Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) executive director Robert Cabrera to take over from resigned Land Transportation Office (LTO) chairman Alfonso Tan Jr.

Cabrera assumed his new post as LTO chief starting last Monday. He became the third LTO head to serve under the Aquino presidency. The administration’s first LTO chief was the late Virginia Torres, a provincemate from Tarlac and a very close friend of the President. She died of cardiac arrest last January 2.

Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) Secretary Joseph Emilio Abaya Jr. disclosed Tan resigned as early as November last year reportedly due to job pressure. Tan was appointed to take over from Torres at LTO.

Tan’s resignation came following severe public criticisms over the long delayed processing and issuance of drivers’ licenses and car plates due to questioned contracts entered into by the LTO, one of the many attached agencies of the DOTC.

Even Abaya himself has been under renewed criticisms over the other problematic agencies and offices under his supervision as DOTC Secretary. Aside from the LTO, Abaya is also the immediate superior of the equally controversy-ridden agencies like the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA); the Light Rail Transit (LRT) Administration; the Metro Rail Transit Authority; the Philippine National Railways (PNR); just to name some of them.

As secretary-general of ruling administration’s Liberal Party, Abaya is another co-terminous official who shall step down from power on the same day President Aquino bows out from Malacañang.