Marcos reappoints Gibo’s wife as special envoy to Unicef

Monica Louise Prieto-Teodoro —photo from Nikki Prieto-Teodoro/Philippine Special Envoy to Unicef Facebook page

MANILA, Philippines — President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has reappointed Monica Louise Prieto-Teodoro, wife of Defense Secretary Gilberto “Gibo” Teodoro Jr., for a third term as his special envoy to the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef).

The Presidential Communications Office (PCO) announced this along with other appointments in the Department of Foreign Affairs, Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) and the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA) on Tuesday.

READ: Unicef: 2 million Filipino children severely food poor

Prieto-Teodoro was first named as the special envoy of the President to Unicef in July 2022. This was renewed a year later, in August 2023.

Unicef is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to children worldwide.

According to the Unicef website, it operates in more than 190 countries and territories “to save children’s lives, defend their rights, and help them fulfill their potential, from early childhood through adolescence.”

Prieto-Teodoro served as representative of Tarlac’s first district from 2007 to 2010, during which she chaired the House committee on the welfare of children.

Diplomats

According to a post on the PCO’s Facebook page, the President also named Giovanni Palec as the country’s nonresident ambassador to North Macedonia, a country in southeast Europe that gained independence in 1991 after the breakup of Yugoslavia. Palec also serves as ambassador to the Hellenic Republic (the official name of Greece), with concurrent jurisdiction over the Republic of Cyprus.

Also appointed was Noel Eugene Eusebio Servigon as ambassador to Romania.

DILG, SBMA

The appointments under the DILG’s Bureau of Fire Protection were Honee Fritz Abangan-Diel and Gallo Macasinag as fire chief superintendent.

The SBMA board of directors, meanwhile, gained four new members: Raul Marcelo (representing the business and investment sectors) and Kenneth Lemuel Rementilla, Honorio Allado III and Maria Cecilia Bitare (representing the private sector). —Julie M. Aurelio