Montemayor vows to halt 'Build, Build, Build', abolish IATF, NTF-ELCAC

Presidential aspirant Dr. Jose Montemayor Jr. on Tuesday said he will discontinue several initiatives of the Duterte administration such as the "Build, Build, Build" infrastructure program to reallocate its budget to the health sector amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

During the Catholic E-Forum hosted by Radio Veritas, Montemayor, a cardiologist, said the budget for the infrastructure projects should be transferred to the Health department which he himself will lead.

“Tanggalin na natin ‘yung mga infrastructures sa mga daan. Bilyon bilyon, trilyon ang nawawala sa ’tin. Ilagay natin sa gamot, ilagay natin sa serbisyo, ilagay natin sa mga ospital. Tanggalin na ‘yang pagbubungkal ng mga daan,” he added.

(Let’s get rid of the infrastructures on the roads. We are losing billions, trillions. Let’s put in instead in medicine, in service, in hospitals. Get rid of the digging on the roads.) 

“Ipapatigil natin ‘yung mga infrastructure projects. Puro kalokohan lang ‘yung Build, Build, Build (We will stop the infrastructure projects. Build, Build, Build is pure nonsense),” he added.

If elected president, Montemayor emphasized his primordial goal is to stop the COVID-19 pandemic immediately, but vowed to initially abolish the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) which is now leading the country’s pandemic response.

He then urged the public to vote for a president who is knowledgeable about the science of COVID-19, taking a swipe at President Rodrigo Duterte's supposed militaristic approach to combat the pandemic.

“Ang mga namumuno dito, hindi naman mga doctor, kundi mga abogado, tapos ang nagi-implement mga militar. Mali po ‘yan. This is a medical emergency, dapat mga doctor, nurses,” he said.

(Those who lead the IATF are not doctors but lawyers, then those who implement the policies are the military. That is wrong. This is a medical emergency, and the doctors and nurses should be the ones to lead it.)

However, Montemayor said he will focus on prevention and mitigation against the viral disease, instead of amping up the vaccination drive.

“‘Yung mga vaccines, hindi po ‘yan eh kasi experimental ‘yan. Ako mismo, researcher ako. Itong mga vaccines ngayon, they are not the conventional vaccines na ginagamit natin,” he said.

(The COVID-19 vaccines are experimental. I am a researcher myself. The vaccines we have now are not the conventional vaccines that we often use.)

He also plans on removing the quarantine restrictions in the country, as well as the alert level system.

“I think we can stimulate the economy, open up the economy. Tanggalin lahat ng lockdown, tanggalin lahat ng GCQ, ECQ, MECQ, at saka ‘yung alert level 1, 2, 3 na mali naman (Let’s remove the lockdowns and alert level system that are wrong),” he said.

Montemayor also vowed to increase the salary of the healthcare workers and fix their “maldistribution” among the National Capital Region and the provinces by deploying them evenly in all areas in the country.

“‘Yung ayaw pumunta ng probinsya na mga doktor, tanggalin natin at i-open natin sa mga doktor na gusto maglingkod sa mga (tao) at bigyan natin sila ng magandang incentives,” he said.

(Those doctors who don’t want to go to the provinces will be removed. Let’s open the opportunity to other doctors who want to serve in provinces and give them good incentives.)

On NTF-ELCAC

Moreover, Montemayor said he will also abolish the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) which was tasked to implement community consultations, problem solving sessions, and local peace dialogues in the country to address insurgency.

Despite this, he stressed that he will continue negotiations with rebel groups to address their demands.

“We have to address the root causes of rebellion—poverty and number two, land injustice,” he said.

It was revealed in November 2021 that only 26 out of the 2,318 projects under the NTF-ELCAC’s barangay development fund have been completed. According to Senate committee chairman Senator Sonny Angara, over 700 of these projects were in the procurement stage, while some 560 were ongoing implementation back then.

President Rodrigo Duterte earlier asked the state security forces to bring the communist insurgency in the country to a close by the end of his term.—AOL, GMA News