2 Malacañang execs latest casualties in fight vs corruption

President Rodrigo Duterte. Normal Alonzo/PRESIDENTIAL PHOTO

President Rodrigo Duterte said he has fired two Malacañang officials over corruption allegations.

Duterte, however, did not identify the two officials.

“I promised you corruption, I will stop it. I will stop it. I just fired two employees from Malacañang for making a call and suggesting that, you know, for just suggesting,” he said Thursday in a speech at the World Trade Center in Pasay City.

The President has repeatedly said he would fire government officials even with just a “whiff” of corruption.

“Even a whiff, or a whisper, of corruption and you’re out,” Duterte warned government officials barely a week before he assumed the presidency in July last year.

In another speech in his hometown Davao City in September 2016, he again threatened corrupt public officials.

“Stop that. I will really skin you alive,” he said.

READ: Duterte warns corrupt gov’t officials: I will skin you alive

Duterte has fired even his longtime allies and closest aides from the Cabinet.

Peter Laviña, who served as spokesman for Duterte during the 2016 national elections, was fired in February following corruption allegations at the NIA. Laviña allegedly received 40 percent kickbacks from contractors.

This was followed by Duterte’s sacking of former Interior Secretary Ismael Sueno in April due to corruption allegations over the irregular purchase of the Rosenbauer firetrucks from Austria.

He also fired Cabinet Undersecretary Maia Chiara Halmen Valdez in April 2017 for overruling National Food Authority Administrator Jason Aquino’s decision to suspend rice importation

The chief executive also sacked Dangerous Drugs Board (DDB) chairman Benjamin Reyes in May 2017 for contradicting the government’s official data on drug addicts.

On Wednesday, Duterte signed Executive Order (EO) No. 43 creating the Presidential Anti-Corruption Commission. /idl

READ: Duterte creates Presidential Anti-Corruption Commission