Duterte marks 3rd year: The best is yet to come

MANILA, Philippines — President Duterte marks today his third year in office with a promise that the “best is yet to come.”

In a report issued yesterday on the President’s accomplishments during the last three years, the Palace boasted of major strides that include a vast infrastructure program and improvements in the welfare as well as increases in the benefits of teachers and soldiers.

Presidential spokesman Salvador Panelo said Duterte managed to implement major reforms in the government related to his anti-corruption and the peace and order campaign despite attacks from critics and political enemies.

“Much has been done in the past three years. The Filipino people can expect the same number of significant achievements, if not more, in the remainder of the President’s term,” he added.

He indicated that Duterte would be able to finish his six-year term, noting that majority of the Filipinos “are in awe of PRRD’s accomplishments,” using Duterte’s initials.

Under his leadership, Malacañang said, the Philippines became one of the strongest economies and growth leaders in the region.

Panelo noted how changing the business climate prompted the influx of foreign investments, which ushered in the Golden Age of Infrastructure in the country with the Build Build Build program.

He added that, with Duterte’s political will, the Philippines “earned the highest credit rating in our economic history with a BBB+ upgrade from global debt watcher Standard and Poor’s.”

The President has similarly intensified the government’s revenue collections to new record highs, which include the collection of around P6 billion from Philippine Airlines for overdue navigational fees and the P40-billion landmark settlement with Mighty Corp.for failing to pay excise taxes.

Panelo reported that Duterte had also pursued an independent foreign policy by means of removing our country’s subservience to the West. This strong stance resulted in the return of the historic Balangiga bells from the US, the reshipment of trash back to Canada and the improvement of relations with other countries, including Russia and China.

“The Chief Executive has demonstrated altruism as the nation’s father by visiting our troops regularly to boost their morale, attending the wakes of our slain soldiers, policemen and other law enforcement personnel who died in the line of duty and taking care of their grieving families,” the spokesman added.

According to Panelo, the country’s 16th President has given the people free space to air their grievances despite their political attacks and despite the political noise and virulent black propaganda against him and his family that were “initiated by his political enemies.”

“He has not filed a single case against them. The President’s record as the Philippines’ Chief Executive speaks for itself,” he stressed.

Halfway through his term, Panelo said Duterte “has attained countless and incomparable feats, including but not limited to, reducing the rate of criminality to an incredible low figure.”

Duterte also dismantled “the illegal drug industry and its apparatus with the voluntary surrender of already more than a million drug personalities and rehabilitating the victims.”

The administration had initiated strategies and measures to thwart the local communist rebellion from spreading and crushing attempts of terrorism originating from different parts of the globe, Malacañang said.

While the President has given priority to the improvement of peace and order in the country, he also laid the foundation that will propel the nation to progress and reach new heights.

“With unprecedented political will, genuine empathy as well as relentless resolve to uplift the general welfare of the people, he signed long-pending bills into law, issued executive measures like free tuition in state universities and colleges, free irrigation to farmers, free internet access in public places,” Panelo said.

The Palace also claimed credit for the institutionalization of feeding programs for public school students, universal health care program, free medicines and financial support to indigent patients, mandatory PhilHealth coverage for persons with disabilities (PWDs), huge and unparalleled subsidies in favor of government hospitals as well as the increase of SSS pensions for senior citizens.

It also cited the improvement on the wages of government employees; doubling of salaries for soldiers, policemen, jail officers and firemen; prohibition of illegal labor subcontracting resulting in the regularization of hundreds of thousands of workers and establishment of work-from-home arrangements.

Duterte also signed into law the proposed measures aimed at reducing poverty – including the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program and the Magna Carta of the Poor – to “uplift the standard of living of those belonging to the underprivileged class of our society.”

He also distributed Certificates of Land Ownership Award to thousands of agrarian reform beneficiaries and farmers and has consistently pushed Congress to legislate the return of the coco levy fund in favor of coconut farmers through a trust fund.