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Rody, Leni trade barbs over storm relief efforts

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Malacañang took a swipe at Vice President Leni Robredo for acting as de facto president although President Rodrigo Duterte remains in charge of the country’s affairs, including the typhoon relief and rehabilitation efforts.

Rody, Leni trade barbs over storm relief efforts
HE SAID, SHE SAID. President Rodrigo Roa Duterte talks to the people after holding a meeting with the Inter-Agency Task Force on the Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID) at the Malago Clubhouse in Malacañang on Wednesday. The Chief Executive lashed at Vice President Leni Robredo (right), who visited the barangays of Amomokpok, Cale, and Poblacion Ilaod in Ragay, Camarines Sur on Wednesday. PRESIDENTIAL PHOTO/OVP PHOTO

Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo made the remarks after the Vice President acted like she was the only official working and responding to the latest calamity.

“The President has been working from the start. That’s why we don’t like VP Leni. It’s okay that you work but don’t make it appear like Secretary Lorenzana said as if you’re the only one working and other officials are inutile,” Panelo said in his “Counterpoint” program aired on government-run PTV4 Wednesday.

On the other hand, Presidential spokesman Harry Roque said Robredo served as the “spare tire” in the presidential succession but made it appear she was “calling the shots” during the disaster relief efforts, adding her behavior was “out of order.”

“Her Twitter posts were completely out of order that she misinformed the people, the nation as if she was the one in charge of the relief effort. She was not,” he said in an interview over CNN Philippines.

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Panelo claimed the government even allowed Robredo to use the military plane for her relief operations.

“You were accommodated to ride the military plane but the problem is, you made it appear that you were the one coordinating, you were bringing the relief goods. If that’s not you, maybe it’s your staff. Of course, you must know this,” Panelo said.

However, both Panelo and Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana later apologized to the Vice President when the latter found out Robredo did not board a C-130 military aircraft when she traveled to her home region of Bicol to deliver aid to communities ravaged by the recent typhoons.

An Air Force helicopter, which left for Catanduanes on November 3, carried relief goods that were prepared by Robredo’s office, Lorenzana said in a statement on Wednesday.

“Secretary Lorenzana said he has sent his apologies to the Vice President for making a comment based on an erroneous report submitted to him,” the Department of National Defense said.

On Tuesday night, Duterte accused the Vice President of being showy during the typhoon response since she knew that he was busy attending the summit and “could not make myself available.”

“Robredo lied to the Filipino people when she supposedly questioned his absence at the height of the storm.  I would like to give a caution to the Vice President. She made a blunder, a big one, and she

practically lied, making her incapable of truth. Telling that I was not present at the height of the typhoon.  I was here. I was attending the ASEAN summit,” the President said.

“There was no need for me to make orders or for you to make an order on the day, God… You were presuming that I should be giving orders on the day of the storm. That is stupid. That is why you cannot become a president really,” Duterte said.

“You’re weak. You didn’t have to give any order because I gave it two or three days before. You do not give orders on the day of the war,” he said.

“I was awake in the morning because of the summit. At the same time, I would whisper to the military guys how it was developing and what was the reaction of our government people there and the resources,” Duterte said.

Duterte also said Robredo knew he was a “night person” and work on government documents at night.

But Robredo on Wednesday remained unfazed by Duterte’s scathing attacks that she was useless in the government’s post- “Ulysses” response and too weak to be the next President in the 2022 elections.

Interviewed in Ragay, Camarines Sur, Robredo said “if you’d say that I haven’t done anything, it is your right to say such. I won’t bother to defend myself because (I believe) the people know that it (allegation) is not (at all) true.”

She said she is too busy to dwell on the President’s threat to make her presidential bid a nightmare.

“That’s very unpresidential. That is his right (to speak). He has been saying that a long time ago. Amidst so many work we have to do, should I entertain that (matter)?” she asked.

Robredo denied asking about the President’s whereabouts at the height of typhoon “Ulysses,” saying “you can review my previous tweet messages.”

She said the Office of the Vice President was very much busy preparing relief goods for the typhoon victims.

Robredo even posted a video of her staff and volunteers while packing relief items.

She called the President a “misogynist” for asking her what time she would go home, and insinuating that she had a second house where she would go home at the end of the day.

"When a President is a misogynist, the conversation goes down to this level,” she said in a tweet.

She took a swipe at Palace chief legal counsel Salvador Panelo, who accused her of boarding a government’s C-130 plane to deliver relief goods to Catanduanes.

“So, to me, those things would only show that there are peddlers of fake news who are just around the President. I believe it is a big sin for the President to react that way. He is reacting to false information. That’s why I appeal that we already have too many peddlers of fake news, let’s not add more to them,” she stressed.

Duterte also slammed Robredo for supposedly ordering the military during the onslaught of the typhoon on Nov. 13.

But Robredo said she just called up the military units to coordinate rescue efforts in Cagayan to connect several netizens who appealed for help.

Meanwhile, amid Duterte’s tirades against Robredo, Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon called for unity and solidarity.

Drilon cited the need to be unified to face the COVID-19 pandemic and the widespread damage caused by three deadly typhoons that hit the country in a span of two months.

“Our situation today calls for greater solidarity and unity. We are facing a grave situation with the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the devastating typhoons Quinta, Rolly and Ulysses. We can and we should rise above politics during these trying times,” Drilon said in a statement Wednesday.

Sen. Francis Pangilinan himself encouraged everyone to stay focused on helping fellow Filipinos who are still trying to get back on their feet.

Asked for his reaction to Duterte’s rants against Robredo on ANC’s “Headstart”, Pangilinan said: “What we need to do is to focus on the sufferings of our people and not be side-tracked into other issues at this point.

“What is urgent is the life-threatening situation of our kababayans who are in the evacuation centers without social distancing, without the necessary masks, without the necessary support. This is what we have to focus on now.”

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