{"id":161492,"date":"2018-04-25T06:30:07","date_gmt":"2018-04-25T10:30:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=161492"},"modified":"2018-04-25T06:30:07","modified_gmt":"2018-04-25T10:30:07","slug":"duterte-appoints-former-sss-commissioner-as-dot-undersecretary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2018\/04\/25\/duterte-appoints-former-sss-commissioner-as-dot-undersecretary\/","title":{"rendered":"Duterte appoints former SSS commissioner as DOT undersecretary"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"President<\/a>
President Rodrigo Duterte appointed sacked Social Security System (SSS) commissioner Jose Gabriel \u201cPompee\u201d La Vi\u00f1a as Department of Tourism (DOT) Undersecretary. (Photo<\/a>: Pompee La Vi\u00f1a\/Facebook<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

President Rodrigo Duterte appointed sacked Social Security System (SSS) commissioner Jose Gabriel \u201cPompee\u201d La Vi\u00f1a as the Department of Tourism (DOT) Undersecretary.<\/p>\n

La Vi\u00f1a\u2019s appointment paper was signed by Duterte on Tuesday, April 24, and was released to the media today, April 25.<\/p>\n

The former commissioner expressed his gratitude to the Chief Executive for his continuing trust and confidence in him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am especially thankful for the fact that as a reader of hearts and with years of experience as a prosecutor, the President does not believe any of the accusations unjustly hurled against me,\u201d La Vi\u00f1a said in a statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is more important to me than any position in government,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Malaca\u00f1ang, last February, announced that the President will not renew the appointment of La Vi\u00f1a and SSS Chairman Amado Valdez as both of them were accused of misusing taxpayers\u2019 money.<\/p>\n

According to Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque Jr., La Vi\u00f1a demanded a budget of P26 million to fund his \u2018social media\u2019 project. He said that he would host the said project and that he requested for a budget of P1.6 million per month for a media advertising program, but these two requests for budget allocations were denied.<\/p>\n

Roque added that La Vi\u00f1a also requested the accreditation of seven brokers to handle SSS investments, which was once again rejected as \u201cthese brokers could not meet the requirements.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Palace official also cited La Vi\u00f1a\u2019s alleged \u201cvilification campaign\u201d against four SSS officials \u201cwho crossed his path\u201d as one of the reasons why he was sacked.<\/p>\n

He further said that La Vi\u00f1a\u2019s termination was proof that Duterte would not tolerate even a \u201cwhiff of corruption\u201d from any government employee under his watch. The President, however, gave him another post in the government, this time in the DOT.<\/p>\n

Reacting to the allegations against him, La Vi\u00f1a said, \u201cWhen the real story of my time in government is finally told, it shall be written that there has never been and will never be a whiff of a whiff of a whiff of corruption in me.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI have had no greater honor in a life overflowing with blessings than to have served the people faithfully as a Commissioner at the Social Security System of the Philippines. I will continue to do so as Undersecretary at the Department of Tourism,\u201d he continued.<\/p>\n

The former commissioner will be taking over the position of tourism undersecretary from Rolando Ca\u00f1izal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

President Rodrigo Duterte appointed sacked Social Security System (SSS) commissioner Jose Gabriel \u201cPompee\u201d La Vi\u00f1a as the Department of Tourism …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":161526,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,95],"tags":[3487,46422,13135],"class_list":["post-161492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-ph","tag-department-of-tourism","tag-jose-gabriel-pompee-la-vina","tag-president-rodrigo-duterte","mauthors-joanna-belle-deala","mauthors-philippine-canadian-inquirer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=161492"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161492\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/161526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=161492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=161492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=161492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}