DFA careerists to go on mass leave if Romulo is retained By Michaela P. del Callar 06/23/2010

DFA careerists to go on mass leave if Romulo is retained

By Michaela P. del Callar 06/23/2010 Department of Foreign Affairs career diplomats have threatened to take a mass leave should President-elect Benigno Aquino III retain DFA Secretary Alberto Romulo whom they have accused of engaging in political turncoatism, incompetence and mishandling of an allegedly graft-tainted passport project. Aquino was quoted as saying that Romulo is a long-time friend of the Aquinos and praised Romulo for being the first among the Arroyo Cabinet officials who publicly announced support for his (Noynoy) candidacy for president. Talk is rife that Romulo will be retained in his post for at least one year, apparently to warm the DFA seat for a losing Liberal Party official, as losers in the elections are slapped with a one-year ban from being appointed to a government position. The 300-strong Union of Foreign Service Officers or Unifors called Romulo a “major impediment” to the DFA’s forward movement. They said they would back Aquino but warned him against extending the term of Romulo, noting that throughout the six years of President Arroyo’s administration, he was its “main representative to the world and its principal defender.” “While he did come out to voice his support for the Aquino candidacy, he did not do the honorable move of resigning immediately from the Cabinet and instead came out with the confusing mixed message of ‘I am standing by the President (Arroyo) until the end of her term and beyond.’ This was fence-sitting of the highest order,” the union said in a June 20 letter sent to Aquino. A copy of the protest letter, which was signed by union president and DFA Assistant Secretary for Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) Affairs Victoria Bataclan, was obtained by the Tribune Tuesday. Bataclan and the diplomats’ union said there is “widespread opposition in the DFA to the reappointment of Romulo to his current position, while there is also the fear of reprisal silencing those who would like to take a more public stand.” “Six years is too much. We can not take it anymore. We are prepared to go on mass leave if he stays,” one senior diplomat told the Tribune.... MORE Source:  The Daily Tribune URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/headlines/20100623hed2.html

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