SENATOR Grace Poe said Monday she planned to look into the government’s expenses on foreign trips following reports that some Cabinet members were traveling abroad with their families.
“I haven’t seen their expense reports, but perhaps when we have our budget hearing I can look into that, we will look into that,” Poe said in a TV interview on Monday.
“We just want to find out if the expenses for their companions were separate,” Poe said.
“I understand that they want to spend some quality time with their families, and even on an official trip. But who paid for them?”
Poe said she was aware that officials could easily say that they paid for themselves, but she reminded the government that it had to send out the message to the public that they were “prudent’ enough when it came to expenses.
“Now, they can always say that ‘we paid for it ourselves,’ and that’s fine. But the government has to be very conservative when it comes to expenses,” Poe said.
She said the government should be able to correct that image especially because citizens were “very conscious” on the lifestyle of the chief executive.
“…In social media, I think government officials should be a little bit careful,” she said.
Malacañang earlier dismissed a critic who said the recent foreign trips of President Rodrigo Duterte became a junket for government officials.
Former President Fidel V. Ramos on Friday criticized the recent visit of Duterte to Russia, which he described as a “junket” due to the presence of several Cabinet members, other government officials and movie celebrities.
“Pardon me for calling it a junket because it now turns out that it was a junket,” said Ramos, adding that some of those officials, who had no role in the trip to Moscow and St. Petersburg should have stayed in the Philippines.
Those in the list of the official delegation of Duterte’s May 22 to 26 visit in Moscow include Senate President Aquilino Pimentel III and Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea and members of the Cabinet such as Alan Peter Cayetano (Foreign Affairs), Carlos Dominguez III (Finance), Vitaliano Aguirre II (Justice), Emmanuel Piñol (Agriculture), Mark Villar (Public Works and Highways), Delfin Lorenzana (Defense), Paulyn Jean Rosell-Ubial (Health), Ramon Lopez (Trade and Industry), Wanda Corazon Tulfo-Teo (Tourism), Arthur Tugade (Transportation), Fortunato De la Peña (Science and Technology), Alfonso Cusi (Energy), Ernesto Pernia (National Economic and Development Authority), Jose Ruperto Martin Andanar (Presidential Communication Operations Office), Hermogenes Esperon (National Security Council), Presidential Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo and Christopher Lawrence Go (Special Assistant to the President).
Philippine National Police director Ronald de la Rosa, controversial blogger and former sexy singer Margaux Justiniano Uson aka “Mocha,” who was recently designated as assistant secretary for social media; Senator Sherwin Gatchalian, Alay Buhay Party-List Rep. Wesley Gatchalian, Duterte’s son Sebastian, and a number of military officials were also included in the list of delegates.
Actor Robin Padilla was one of the celebrities who joined Duterte’s visit to Russia. He was reportedly the host during the Filipino community meeting in Moscow.
Ramos said a number of those who joined Duterte’s trip “should have been in their posts because this is not the first time there have been threats.”
“There is a certain failure of organization in the entire government right now,” he said.
Duterte cut short his trip and returned to Manila late Wednesday afternoon after declaring martial law in Mindanao following the terrorist attack by suspected members of Maute group in Marawi City.