Sara admits struggles as both VP, education chief; says mayoralty a good training

Vice President Sara Duterte on Thursday admitted that she had her share of struggles as the highest elected official in the country and in her concurrent role as secretary of education.

In an interview with SMNI, Sara said her three terms as mayor of Davao City helped a good deal, adding that it was ideal for mayors and governors to handle executive posts at the national level.

“In the three terms, madami talaga akong natutunan. And I would really say na pinakamaganda na umakyat sa mga national positions are the mayors and governors,” Sara said in an interview on SMNI.

(In the three terms, I really learned a lot. And I would really say that it would be more ideal that mayors and governors run in national positions.)

The vice president said she experienced challenges holding the two offices of the OVP and DepEd because of its different mandates.

Sara said she first created two teams in order to properly allocate the job among her personnel.

“Itong sa national position ko naman ngayon when I sat as a vice president, medyo nahirapan din ako kasi dalawang offices siya. Meron kaming OVP, then meron kaming DepEd, and magkaiba yung mandate nila. So ang unang ginawa ko talaga is to create two teams na hindi nagcrocrossover yung mga teams so makatutok sila sa trabaho,” Sara said.

(In my national position now when I sat as a vice president, I also had a bit of a hard time because I held two offices. I handled OVP and DepEd, and their mandates are different. So the first thing I really did was to create two teams in order not to crossover and they could focus on work.)

“I felt if one person is struggling two offices baka maconfuse siya ano ba ako ngayon OVP, ito ba ang trabaho ng DepEd. So yun yung pinakaunang ginawa ko, nagdefine ako ng grupo for OVP and nagdefine ako ng grupo for DepEd,” she added.

(I felt if one person is struggling in handling two offices they might get confused. So that's the first thing I did, I defined a group for OVP and I defined a group for DepEd.)

Sara said most of her personnel in OVP were also her former colleagues in Davao City.

She said she wanted to bring their success stories and share it with the other local government units.

“Karamihan ng mga OVP ay yung kasamahan ko din dito sa city government of Davao. Kasi ang mga dinala kong projects sa OVP were success stories natin na dito sa Davao City, so I wanted to share that with other LGUs,” she added.

(Most of the OVPs are also my former colleagues in Davao City because the projects I brought to the OVP were our success stories here in Davao City, so I wanted to share that with other LGUs.)

Sara was proclaimed the winner of the vice presidential race in Eleksyon 2022 on May 25 with 32,208,417 votes.

She has also been picked by President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. to lead the DepEd.

The vice president has accepted the offer and vowed to produce "skilled learners with the mindset to realize their full potential as individuals." —NB, GMA Integrated News