Speaker Ferdinand Martin Romualdez, in a reconciliatory gesture, said he respects and supports everybody in the government, including Vice President and concurrent Education Secretary Sara Duterte.
Romualdez issued the statement in Tokyo, Japan where he was part of the entourage of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to partake of the 50th anniversary observance of the ASEAN-Japan friendship.
The Speaker was particularly addressing an overseas Filipino worker who approached him with a placard that read “Please support VP Inday Sara Duterte.”
“I agree with the [OFW] who greeted me in Japan with a placard bearing a significant message. We should all support and respect the Vice President. The same respect and support that we should extend to the President and other government officials,” the Speaker said later in a statement sent to the media.
Relations between the Vice President and the Speaker were strained over the confidential intelligence fund controversy.
It was the President’s second visit to Japan this year, the first being mainly to meet with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.
A social media post for the commemorative event said ties between the ASEAN and Japan was for “peace, stability, development, and prosperity in the Asian Region.”