Malacañang on Wednesday said there is no impending revamp in the Cabinet, amid reports that Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II would be sacked by President Rodrigo Duterte due to the Department of Justice’s controversial decisions over drug personalities Kerwin Espinosa and Peter Lim.
The President earlier announced that several Cabinet officials would be fired after the Holy Week break, citing corruption as the main reason.
Senior Deputy Executive Secretary Menardo Guevarra also rebuffed reports that Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III submitted his letter of resignation to the President last week, saying it was all hearsay.
“The President has no plans of reshuffling his Cabinet, because the Cabinet Secretaries are busy in implementing the programs of the administration. They were all invited to attend the Cabinet meeting,” Guevarra said in a press briefing.
Meanwhile, Senator Francis Pangilinan said Aguirre should not only be sacked but should also be charged with plunder and graft for the many “foolishness” he committed in his job.
Pangilinan, who is also president of the opposition Liberal Party, noted the LP has long been asking for Aguirre’s removal from the DoJ.
“From one blunder to the next, Secretary Aguirre, wittingly or unwittingly, has been showing how unfit he is for the position,” the senator said.
However, Guevarra said the Office of the President has not received any letter of resignation from either Bello or Aguirre.
“The President has just returned from his Holy Week visit to his hometown [Davao City] and he has not given any statement regarding this matter,” he added.
Guevarra said Palace officials have not talked to the President since last week, adding: “If there will be movement in the Cabinet, it will be the President who will announce it.”
Duterte earlier said he is not satisfied with the performance of some of his Cabinet members and planned to fire some of his top officials.
Although he did not reveal any details, the President claimed heads will roll once he returns to Manila after the Lenten break.
“The President seems to be satisfied with the performance of Aguirre,” Guevarra told reporters.
However, Pangilinan said that from being linked to the P50-million bribery scandal “involving resigned Immigration officials who are his fraternity brothers, to spreading false information against lawmakers over the Marawi siege, to downgrading the murder charges against Supt. Marvin Marcos to homicide despite Senate and NBI findings, to clearing Nick Faeldon and several Customs officials in the P6.4-billion shabu smuggling case, to the continuing drug trade in the National Bilibid [Prison] under his watch, and to dismissing the drug charges against Kerwin Espinosa and Peter Lim — the list of his inadvertence is long and serious.”
“One might wonder how credible the charges he filed against Senator Leila de Lima were. In one development after another, the charges are now being bared to be false and baseless,” he added.
Senator Panfilo Lacson said reports about Duterte’s plan to fire Aguirre are “rumors” until and unless the president himself announces.
“I think I should be prudent in not speculating along with the others. These are speculations,” he said.
Aguirre was a classmate of the President at the San Beda College of Law. Aguirre graduated cum laude and class valedictorian in 1971.
He was also the lead litigator in the celebrated Hubert Webb case, and was a private prosecutor in the impeachment trial of the late Chief Justice Renato Corona.
Guevarra said the President has been generally satisfied with the performance of the Secretary of Justice, except for certain debacles that happened to the DOJ recently, as enumerated by Pangilinan.