MANILA -- The Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) and the Presidential Communications Operations Office (PCOO) will be the lead agencies in charge of raising public awareness about federalism and the administration’s plan to change the country’s form of government.
Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque made this remark noting that the Consultative Committee (ConCom) tasked to draft the Federal Constitution will mark the end of its six-month term next month as prescribed under Executive Order No. 10.
“Well, actually, they (ConCom) have a comm plan, but we have a broader comm plan. The lead agency here, because of the limited life of the Consultative Committee which expires this August 6, if I’m not mistaken," Roque said in a Palace briefing.
“The initiative is now being led by DILG and PCOO and my office in so far as I will be part of the dissemination team. But it’s DILG that is the lead agency in this regard,” he added.
Last week, Roque said Duterte has created an inter-governmental task force led by himself and Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea to spearhead the public information drive on federalism.
He said the task force intends to bring down the information drive to the barangay level.
Mocha’s help
ConCom senior technical assistant and spokesperson Ding Generoso said the expert panel is also eyeing the help of PCOO Assistant Secretary Mocha Uson in promoting the shift to a federal system of government.
In a text message, Generoso explained that Uson could simply “help” write about federalism in either columns or her blog.
“I just said she can help. She can write about it in her column in the (Philippine) Star and (her) blog which have a wide reach. That would help increase awareness,” Generoso said.
When sought for a comment on the ConCom seeking Uson’s help, Roque said the government is also coming up with standardized dissemination materials to explain federalism.
“Anyone is welcome to disseminate. Of course, we seek to come up with standardized dissemination materials so that no one will deviate from the messaging,” Roque said.
“So we’re developing materials for disseminators, and we are formulating a module to train first the trainors. And we’re developing a module for dissemination so that anyone who will follow the module can disseminate properly,” he added.
PHP90-M budget
Roque earlier said the government will be allocating some PHP90 million for its federalism information campaign.
Of this amount, PHP50 million will come from the ConCom’s savings and an additional PHP30 million will also be set aside for the expert panel.
Meanwhile, PHP10 million will go to the PCOO, which will be tasked to produce information drive materials.
“Ang na-identify pa lang (What we have identified so far), to be candid about it, is an initial PHP40 million pero (but) PHP30 million lang ang pu-puwede gamitin (can only be used) because PHP10 million will go to PCOO,” Roque said.
“And then apparently the Consultative [Committee] has savings of about PHP50 million but they’re not sure how to spend it because matatapos na ‘yung buhay ng Consultative [Committee] (the life of the Consultative Committee will end) this August. So the initial amount that has been identified for dissemination is PHP90 million but PHP10 million will go to PCOO for production of materials,” he added. (PNA)
