Duterte has own standards on who’s competent or not, Palace says

July 11, 2018

Malacanang defended on Wednesday President Rodrigo Duterte's statement calling Vice President Leni Robredo as incompetent.

In a radio interview, Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said the President could have made such remark because his basis was his almost 30 years of experience in government.

"The assessment of the President that VP is incompetent, we can't prevent him from saying that because the President has been serving the government for almost 30 years," Roque said, noting Duterte could have his own "standards or guidelines" who is competent.

"He is just saying what he feels. Let's respect that because this is an observation of a person who has been serving the government for a long time," Roque explained.

In an interview in Pampanga on Tuesday, Duterte did not want Robredo to succeed him in the event that the form of government shifts to federalism.

He said Robredo could not be the transition leader as he wanted the people to elect a new one.

Meanwhile, on Robredo's statement that she would unite all the opposition groups to be their leader, Roque did not see anything wrong with it.

"It's just right for her to stand as the opposition leader," he said in another radio interview.

He noted there was a time  Robredo wanted to be a member of the Cabinet, which only confused everything.

But with Robredo's latest pronouncement, Roque said it only means that Robredo was no longer interested to accept any position under the Duterte administration. Celerina Monte/DMS