Teddy Boy Locsin accepts DFA chief post

Teodoro "Teddy Boy" Locsin has accepted President Rodrigo Duterte's offer to become the next secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), replacing Alan Peter Cayetano.

"I was asked I said yes," said Locsin on Twitter.

He added: "I didn't say no when asked as I didn't when he told me I was UN ambassador."

"If my Tito Chito Ayala trusted him implicitly; how can I not. Still UN work is like sharpening a blade everyday."

A former lawmaker representing Makati's first district, Locsin is currently the country's Permanent Representative to the United Nations.

"I will be Secretary of Foreign Affairs which includes the UN; I will have a direct hand until the architecture of sovereign independence in all matters of state that my team started to erect is remitted. Talent that doesn't exist outside DFA will complete it," Locsin said.

In a press conference in Indonesia on Thursday, Duterte said  he has chosen Locsin to replace Cayetano, who is expected to run for congressman of Taguig City in the 2019 elections.

Aside from being a former lawmaker, Locsin is also a lawyer and a former journalist. —KBK, GMA News