Duterte to new Justice Sec. Guevarra: ‘Do what is right’

Newly appointed Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra will have to carry out his mandate guided by one instruction from President Rodrigo Duterte.

“Do what is right,” Guevarra said in a text message on Friday when asked about the President’s marching order to him.

Guevarra also said the President told him “to bring back the dignified image of the Department of Justice.”

He thanked the President for trusting him to lead the Justice Department, which has control and supervision over agencies including the National Prosecution Service, Bureau of Immigration, Bureau of Corrections, Public Attorney’s Office, and the National Bureau of Investigation.

“The President seldom sees me, yet he entrusts such a sensitive position to me. I’m overwhelmed with such confidence,” Guevarra told GMA News Online.

The former Malacañang official could not give a date on when he will report for work at the DOJ, saying his priority now is to wind up his affairs at the Office of the Executive Secretary.

Guevarra succeeded Vitaliano Aguirre II, who resigned on Thursday amid rumors that he was the next on the President’s chopping block.

Aguirre had been the subject of criticism and even presidential disappointment after a panel of state prosecutors dismissed the charges against suspected drug personalities, one of whom had confessed at the Senate to distributing drugs and one of whom was a convicted drug lord.

The former DOJ chief has yet to release a statement on his departure from the Cabinet. —KG/RSJ, GMA News