Two months after he was appointed to the Department of Tourism (DOT), President Rodrigo Duterte now transferred Tourism Undersecretary Jose Gabriel “Pompee” La Viña to the Department of Agriculture (DA).
La Viña was appointed as undersecretary of the DA, taking over the place of Bernadette Romulo-Puyat, who is now the new DOT chief after Wanda Tulfo-Teo resigned from her post amid an alleged corruption scandal.
His appointment papers were signed on Wednesday, June 6, and released to media on Thursday, June 7.
La Viña was first appointed as a member of the Social Security Commission (SSC) in November 2016; however, the President decided not to renew his appointment to the agency due to corruption allegations.
Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque Jr. earlier said that La Viña demanded a budget of P26 million to fund his ‘social media’ project with himself as a TV host and that he also requested for a budget of P1.6 million per month for a media advertising program. However, both requests for budget allocations were denied.
Roque added that La Viña also requested the accreditation of seven brokers to handle SSS investments, which was once again rejected as “these brokers could not meet the requirements.” He also cited La Viña’s alleged “vilification campaign” against four SSS officials “who crossed his path” as one of the reasons why he was sacked.
Despite this, Duterte, who said would not tolerate even a ‘whiff of corruption’ during his administration, gave La Viña another chance to serve the government as he reappointed him to the Tourism department.
La Viña, for his part, earlier denied the allegations lodged against him, maintaining that “there has never been and will never be a whiff of a whiff of a whiff of corruption in me.”
The recently appointed DA undersecretary graduated magna cum laude at the Ateneo de Manila University (ADMU) with a degree in Philosophy. He holds a Master’s degree in Entrepreneurship from the Asian Institute of Management.
When he was in college, La Viña became the Editor-in-Chief of Ateneo’s official student publication, The Guidon, and was also a member of the Student Council.
As one of the Duterte’s supporters, La Viña served as the social media director of his presidential campaign and was also a member of its Media Central and Communications Group, according to his resumé online.
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