MANILA, Philippines – Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana on Wednesday thanked President Rodrigo Duterte for working on the pay increase of soldiers.
Speaking at the Department of National Defense’s 80th anniversary rites at Camp Aguinaldo on Wednesday, Lorenzana said the pay hike “tremendously raised the military’s morale and inspired them to do their jobs better.”
The pay increase of soldiers was one of the campaign promises of Duterte before he was elected president in 2016.
Lorenzana said the biggest beneficiary of the salary raise of troops were the widows of the soldiers and officers who were killed in action.
“Their salary then was very small,” he said.
The defense chief also thanked the President for his allocation of P100 million a month for the medicines of active and retired soldiers at Veterans Memorial Medical Center and V. Luna Hospital.