Duterte becomes emotional while visiting wounded soldiers

President Rodrigo Duterte during his visit to wounded soldiers at the Camp Navarro General Hospital in Zamboanga City on Saturday, Dec. 17, 2016. (Photo from a PCOO video posted on Facebook)

ZAMBOANGA CITY — President Rodrigo Duterte turned emotional on Saturday as he read a letter handed over by one of 18 wounded soldiers he visited at the Camp Navarro General Hospital inside the Western Mindanao Command headquarters here.

It was not clear what the letter said, but the President was visibly holding his tears as he was reading it.

The letter was written by one of the children of Pfc. Charlie Shine Carinal of the 68th Infantry Battalion, who was wounded in Sumisip, Basilan on Friday during operations against the Abu Sayyaf.

In an interview with reporters following his visit to the wounded soldiers, Duterte urged the Filipino people to help “take care of our soldiers.”

“They give their lives to this republic,” Duterte said. “We must ease their sufferings and my work here is to visit them, give them some cash and brand new cellular phones.”

It was the President’s fifth visit here. As in his previous visits, he also pinned medals to wounded soldiers and gave financial assistance to the families of three troopers killed in anti-Abu Sayyaf operations, which also took place in Sulu.

The wounded soldiers got a total of P110,000 in financial assistance.

Col. Restituto Padilla, the spokesperson of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), said each of the surviving families of slain soldiers got over P500,000 in financial assistance.

The amount include the assistance of P200,000 from the AFP, along with P80,000 in funeral assistance.

The President, he said, gave P250,000 from the Presidential Social Fund.

“This is to assist families of our heroes,” Padilla said. “Over all, if you sum it up, the amount they are getting would be over P500,000 both from the units as well as from the commander in chief.”

Padilla said Duterte was also reviewing the amount of assistance that both wounded and slain soldiers receive.

“The President is advocating for an increase in the amount of the financial assistance being given to slain or wounded soldiers,” he said. /ATM