{"id":225139,"date":"2019-07-30T23:22:48","date_gmt":"2019-07-31T03:22:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=225139"},"modified":"2019-07-30T23:22:48","modified_gmt":"2019-07-31T03:22:48","slug":"palace-looking-into-complaints-vs-duque","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2019\/07\/30\/palace-looking-into-complaints-vs-duque\/","title":{"rendered":"Palace looking into complaints vs. Duque"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
\u201cThe SOP (standard operating procedure) is any complaint, as the President says, that reaches his table, will always be subject of a serious investigation by the Office of the President,\u201d Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo said in a media interview on Tuesday. (File photo<\/a>: Office of the Presidential Spokesperson\/Facebook<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MANILA<\/strong>\u00a0— Malaca\u00f1ang is looking into graft and plunder complaints against Health Secretary Francisco Duque over a lease agreement between a company owned by his family and the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth).<\/p>\n

\u201cThe SOP (standard operating procedure) is any complaint, as the President says, that reaches his table, will always be subject of a serious investigation by the Office of the President,\u201d Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo said in a media interview on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cAny allegation against any member of the Cabinet or against any official of the government of corruption or conflict of interest or any act illegal is always a serious concern of the office of the President,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Despite these allegations, Panelo maintained that President Rodrigo Duterte still trusts Duque pending results of the OP\u2019s investigation.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe (Duque) has responded to the questions of the issue of propriety so if there are complaints against him, investigation will be undertaken and until such time that there is no definite finding of any act which is in violation of the law, Secretary of Health still has the trust and confidence of the President\u201d Panelo said.<\/p>\n

In a joint affidavit filed before the Office of the Ombudsman on Friday (June 21), complainants, who are parents of victims of the dengue vaccine Dengvaxia, accused Duque of graft and plunder for entering into a contract which allowed a PhilHealth regional office to rent land belonging to his family.<\/p>\n

Panelo defended Duque from allegations, stressing that the fact that Duque\u2019s family owned a land where a PhilHealth provincial office is situated does not immediately prove that there is a \u201cconflict of interest\u201d. PhilHealth is an attached agency of the Department of Health.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Secretary of Health has already responded to that; as far as he is concerned, there is no conflict of interest,\u201d said Panelo, who is also Chief Presidential Legal Counsel.<\/p>\n

Citing Duque, Panelo emphasized that there is no conflict of interest because the contracts the PhilHealth entered into were signed prior to his being Health Secretary and others, he has divested of his interest and\/or shares.<\/p>\n

Panelo also welcomed Senator Christopher \u201cBong\u201d Go\u2019s call for an investigation into these PhilHealth transactions. Go is the new chairman of the Senate committee on health.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Panelo also rejected claims that the appointment of Duque\u2019s brother, Gonzalo, as Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA) administrator was a conflict of interest.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy should there be a conflict of interest with regard to that? There\u2019s none,\u201d Panelo said.<\/p>\n

Earlier, Panelo described Gonzalo Duque as \u201ca man of competence and integrity\u201d who would help \u201cchampion the cause of the Filipino coconut farmers\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MANILA\u00a0— Malaca\u00f1ang is looking into graft and plunder complaints against Health Secretary Francisco Duque over a lease agreement between a …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":222653,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-225139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-ph","mauthors-azer-parrocha","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225139","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\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225139"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225139\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":225140,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225139\/revisions\/225140"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/222653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}