RALPH G. RECTO
17th Congress
(Member, 10 August 2016 - 17 August 2016)
(Minority Floor Leader, 17 August 2016 - 01 May 2017)
(Member, 01 May 2017 - 30 June 2019)
17th Congress
(Member, 10 August 2016 - 17 August 2016)
(Minority Floor Leader, 17 August 2016 - 01 May 2017)
(Member, 01 May 2017 - 30 June 2019)
FEB
07
2018
Seconding speech for FRANCISCO T. DUQUE III for the confirmation of his ad interim appointment as Secretary of the Department of Health
Plenary Session No. 9, Second Regular Session
Mr. President, my dear colleagues.
The nominee was my seatmate in the Arroyo Cabinet, which was when I saw how good a doctor he is. When I dug into a bag of “chicharon”, he never lectured me about cholesterol; when wine was served, he saw to it that my glass was always full; and whenever I did my patriotic duty of paying excise taxes - one cigarette puff at a time, he did not break into a sermon about nicotine.
The nominee is first and foremost a physician. But when the country calls, he does not shirk from being conscripted to do hard labor in the government, as had happened to him seven times in the past. And as you have read in his impressive CV, not one of his government postings in the past 20 years was cushy. All had national mandates which required a combination of competence and compassion which only those with a head and a heart, like him, can do.
As Health Secretary, he was in-charge of the health of the people.
As PhilHealth President, he was the health insurer of us all.
As GSIS Chairman, he was steward of billions of pesos in pension, assets of millions of public sector workers, including this building, which means that he was for a time the Senate’s landlord.
As Civil Service Commission head, he did not only make sure that civil servants gave the best service to the people, but that civil servants also got the best treatment from their government.
Although these offices have different missions, he had only one motto to guide him through all of them. Not lengthy mantras nor clever maxims, but three simple words he embraced the day he made treating the sick, his life's mission. “Do no harm.” And he did no harm indeed.
His integrity remains as lily-white as the doctor's coat he wore in the charity wards of the UST Hospital, in the operating rooms of Pangsinan Medical Centers, in the laboratories of Georgetown University.
"Do no harm" could also be the words in his family's coat of arms, if ever there was one.
He comes from a distinguished family of doctor-servants. His father was the Health Secretary during the time of Pres. Diosdado Macapagal and his mother, of the patriotic Tiongson clan of Bulacan, was also a physician whose other mission was to build world-class schools in Northern Luzon.
So it can be said, Mr. President, that the nominee has a two-person oversight committee looking down from up above to see that he, indeed, will do no harm.
Mr. President, my dear colleagues, this is the nominee's second time to be at the helm of the DOH. In short, he has been there and have done that, unlike many appointees we see today who report to work on training wheels and whose motto is "Do most harm."
Because of his experience, trainings, and integrity, I can say, with all certainty, that he has been inoculated against any scams that will harm or hurt the DOH and the public it serves.
He can smell scam miles away with the same ease that he can diagnose a disease without the need for a stethoscope.
Those who doubt this should read what he had done in the DOH, and in other offices, to assuage their fears.
He pursued aggressive MDG goals. He implemented an ethical Milk Code. He modernized hospitals. He purged PhilHealth of many of its conservative stands, among other game-changing initiatives.
As a doctor, he knows what a pill is from a placebo, and can distinguish band-aid solutions from holistic care. He diagnoses diseases and problems the way he tunes up his vintage cars, by getting his hands dirty and going under the hood.
This is the hands-on manager we need at DOH today, one who can solve today's ills while preventing future problems, one who treats the causes and not the symptoms; one who is both curative and preventive in outlook.
It is, thus, my honor and privilege to endorse the confirmation of the appointment of Francisco "Pingkoy" Tiongson Duque III as Secretary of Health.
Thank you, Mr. President.
MAR
21
2018
Seconding speech for MANUEL ANTONIO JAVIER TEEHANKEE for the consent of his appointment as Permanent Representative of the Republic of the Philippines to the World Trade Organization in Geneva Switzerland
Plenary Session No. 14, Second Regular Session
Thank you, Mr. President.
Mr. President, if diplomacy is the art of telling people to go to hell in such a way that they ask for directions, then Dondi Teehankee could say it in a manner full of charm.
A tough negotiator, he can forcefully step on toes and the other person would think he is playing footsies.
He is our man in Geneva and because it is a lovely city, many would automatically conclude that the World Trade Organization is a cushy post that merely requires shopping on Rue du Marche, sipping espresso in some lakefront café or daydreaming inside the Patek Museum.
Although trade walls have come down in the post-GATT era, there remains a frontline in which the Republic must send a sentinel to watch over our interests - and that is the WTO in Geneva.
While other posts have Filipino expatriates as constituencies to serve, our man in the WTO serves all the people back home.
They include tuna fishermen, rice farmers, electronic parts producers, entrepreneurs and factory workers, whose industry must be served, and not subverted, whenever trading winds change direction. The nominee has the talent and the training to do just that.
He's been to Wall Street and to Padre Faura. He is a Bar topnotcher, an achievement which can be attributed to nature and nurture in equal parts.
This citizen of the world could have stayed abroad and parlayed his London School of Economics and Michigan masteral degrees and his years of work in blue-chip law firms into membership in America's one percent. But this patriot opted to come back, to do hard labor in government for low pay. The economist that he is, he probably knows how to spend his psychic income with gusto.
I have been with the nominee on several occasions abroad, our encounters both, social and official in nature, and he impressed me as a talented man abreast, not just with the latest in law and finance, but also in culture.
He can parse tariff lines with the minutiae that he can explain to you the movement of a Swiss watch.
He can cite the fine print of the law with the same ease that he can describe the signature strokes of his favorite painters.
He knows how to mix drinks and then deliver a toast, which doesn’t mix metaphors.
And frankly, Mr. Chairman, in my few forays abroad, I have met ambassadors like him, like the one I met last October who can talk about the Laws of the Seas in one minute and the differences between local cheeses the next.
It is in them that I see the spirit and the spunk of legendary diplomats of yore, like Leonie Guerrero who was my grandfather's law partner, live. And this is the standard and the tradition that -- let me stress, political ambassadors must live up to – of being cultured and courageous, at the same time dedicated, dependable and dignified, because the Foreign Service must deploy our best and brightest and not the least and the last of our race; the highly competent and not just the well connected.
Mr. President, my dear colleagues, Manuel Antonio Javier Teehankee is one of our generation's best and brightest. Let us not further delay his deployment to Geneva.
Thank you, Mr. President.
MAY
30
2018
Seconding speech for BERNADETTE FATIMA ROMULO-PUYAT for the confirmation of her ad interim appointment as Secretary, Department of Tourism
Plenary Session No. 16, Second Regular Session
Mr. President, my esteemed colleagues, ladies and gentlemen:
The nominee might probably break the Commission record as to the number of endorsement speeches.
That the support flows from both sides of the aisle is a testament to her record of clean, competent and committed public service.
If ever there was one question, it isn't why she has been appointed, but why it took so long for her to be elevated to Cabinet rank.
When her value was finally rewarded, she had by then accumulated a wealth of experience that made her extremely overqualified for the job.
At a time when the last and the least, and not the best and the brightest, are dumped on agencies, DOT is fortunate to have her. It did not only get a manager, but an ad model as well.
She is one Tourism secretary who can also be the national poster girl for tourism.
As you can see, she has the face that could launch a thousand cruise ships. And I say that with authority having been married to the original Eskinol girl.
But let us focus on the nominee's beautiful mind instead, for that is what matters most.
Her two decades of government service is detailed in three pages of fine print in her CV.
While her longest stint has been with the Department of Agriculture, which spanned three administrations, what is not well known is that she had served in four dozen task forces, committees, advisory councils, and corporate boards.
Despite her punishing workload, at home and at work, she made time to teach fiscal policy for 20 years in that public school in Diliman.
This, I believe, will serve her in good stead as she restores sense on how the billions of pesos allocated to DOT, both regular and off-budget, are spent.
For one, I know that this professor - and practitioner - of fiscal discipline will not go into the carenderia business, despite the spectacular success of her farm-to-table, Manila-to-Madrid gastronomical projects which allowed the world's leading food writers to savor Filipino culinary masterpieces and their readers to salivate for them.
She will not waste her time and our money in cooking up useless gimmicks which will only trigger a turo-turo or finger-pointing frenzy among the cooks.
If ever, she will wisely spend the bulk of the DOT marketing budget on the Korean, Japanese, Chinese markets or the so-called kimchi, sushi, dimsum markets, which account for 7 in 10 tourist arrivals.
She is what is needed at a time when tourism is buffeted with many challenges, from increasing competition from abroad, to the worsening contamination of our famous beaches.
Mr. President, it is my honor to endorse, second and vote for the confirmation of the appointment of Berna Tecson Romulo-Puyat as Secretary of Tourism.
NOV
28
2018
Seconding speech for TEODORO LOPEZ LOCSIN JR. for the confirmation of his ad interim appointment as Secretary, Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA)
Plenary Session No. 5, Third Regular Session
Mr. President, fellow Senators, colleagues from the House: A fellow Batangueño based in Dubai, one of the fans of this “Twitter rockstar”, has texted me to confirm the appointee because he is “an OFW, an Outstanding Facebook Warrior”.
For this is true, Mr. President: While we may not have missiles to launch, we possess something more potent – “Locsin missiles”, to which no shield has been proven effective against their withering fire.
As our Vice Chairman, the good Congressman Zamora has said, he will not let an insult unanswered, that “he will tweet in his office, he will tweet in his car, he will tweet in the streets, he will never surrender.”
No statesman since Churchill has mobilized the English language and sent it to defend his country. But it is a role not new to him. He has articulated his people’s beliefs from the moment he learned to pound his father’s typewriter. He is the unofficial spokesman of the Filipino race.
Whether his opinions are in long form or in 240 characters, they represent the best in the craft – they never fail to delight the reader, inspire the nation, and influence history. Without him, public discourse will be monopolized by people who will just say, the loudest, what is on everybody’s mind.
I can say, with authority, that he is the most well-read Foreign Affairs’ Secretary in the world today.
I can’t imagine Boris, the Brexiter, having read Waltz or Morgentau, or Pompeo of Foggy Bottom having encountered Spengler. Kissinger, perhaps, but the person not his writings.
At a time when diplomacy is practiced by those who “speak softly and carry a selfie stick”, it pays to have a Foreign Affairs Secretary who is brash, brave and brilliant because it will allow our country to punch above its weight. But he did not learn what he needs to do for his present job from books alone.
He is a lawyer, a journalist, a publisher, a Kapuso. He had sat in the boards of blue chip companies. He spent three terms in Congress as a resident editor, who gave free tutorials on how to write clear and concise laws to colleagues whose verbosity was as big as their egos. But he didn’t grab credit for his edits. An example is the Cheaper Medicines Law, which he fashioned into one good piece of legislation.
He went to Harvard for his LLM. But it was in Makati where he mastered public diplomacy. I would say that anyone who can walk the “riles” of Makati at night without gin coming out of his ears or blood from his side is one smart and charming diplomat. It is also where he learned to genuinely serve the people.
So when he gives the order that the Filipino must not ring thrice or an embassy must not sound like the opening scene of “Once Upon A Time in America”, where an unattended phone constantly rings, he means it.
He now has 110 million constituents: 100 million here, plus 10 million abroad. He is the best man for the job.
It is still my great honor to vote for the confirmation of my good friend, Teodoro Lopez Locsin, Jr., as our Secretary of Foreign Affairs.”