Palace: Duterte rejected House call to remove Diokno

President Rodrigo Duterte stood by Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno amid calls from congressmen for the chief executive to remove him over issues surrounding the proposed national budget for 2019, Malacañang said Thursday.

Presidential spokesperson Salvador Panelo said the Palace respects the sentiment of the House of Representatives even as it reiterated that “the President continues to trust the Budget Secretary and the confidence reposed on him remains unimpaired.”

Asked if the President rejected House’s call to remove Diokno, Panelo said in a text message: “Is the statement not clear enough?”

The Palace also hailed Diokno’s record in government service which “to the mind of the chief executive and of the rest of his Cabinet, is unblemished.”

“As one of the administration's economic managers, President Duterte considers him as one of the best and brightest in his official family. Secretary Diokno's reputation as an upright, competent and honest public servant stays solid up to this day,” Panelo said.

The House on Wednesday adopted House Resolution 2365 urging Duterte to reconsider Diokno’s appointment, a day after the budget chief attended the Question Hour to answer queries from lawmakers related to the proposed P3.757-trillion budget.

Lawmakers said Diokno failed to sufficiently address the issue on the P75-billion  augmentation in the proposed budget of the Department of Public Works and Highways for 2019 without the knowledge and consent of Secretary Mark Villar.

The resolution also stated that Diokno was unable to explain how CT Leoncio Construction and Trading, a company that supposedly bagged billions of pesos in contracts across the country, also obtained projects in Sorsogon province, where his daughter's parents-in-law are running in the 2019 polls.

Diokno has since denied allegations of anomaly in the budget augmentation and that he supposedly used his influence regarding the allocation of P2.8 billion worth of infrastructure projects in Casiguran and Sorsogon.

“Should it feel that there was irregularity in the allocation of the budget, it (Congress) can always correct it apart from having the option of recommending the filing of charges against those they deem are responsible for the transgressions should the same amount to a crime,” Panelo said.

“In the same manner that the President doesn’t tell Congress who it will choose as its officers and how to go about it, we wish that its members return the same courtesy.” —KBK, GMA News