President Duterte is “exasperated” over the delays in the implementation of the Marawi City rehabilitation project, Malacañang said on Thursday.
Ironically, the groundbreaking for the Marawi rehabilitation was supposed to take place on October 17, but was moved back again at the end of the month because President Duterte cannot attend the event due to prior commitments.
Duterte had a series of events to attend on that day.
Both Japanese Special Adviser for Foreign Affairs Katsuyuki Kawai and United Arab Emirates Chief of Federal Authority for Identity Ali Mohammad Al Shamsi also paid courtesy calls on the President. The President also signed an oil exploration deal with an Israeli firm on Wednesday.
Nonetheless, Presidential Spokesman and Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Salvador S. Panelo said the President’s nonattendance doesn’t mean that he was not interested.
“In fact, he has been doing a lot of things for the rehabilitation of that place,” Panelo said.
He added that the President shares the sentiment because he just wants the full implementation of the rehabilitation.
“Yes, he was exasperated but then again, the red tape was already done. It is getting started already,” he said.
“As I said, sometimes you cannot also avoid delays. Our problem in Marawi is too big. What is important is it will start at the end of the month and that will continue,” he said.
Panelo is also hopeful that the administration will not be criticized with the way it handled the Marawi rehabilitation, like how the former Aquino administration handled the rehabilitation of Tacloban City after Supertyphoon Yolanda.
“Hopefully not, because the President hates bureaucratic red tape. That is precisely why he said, he appoints [former] military men because they don’t ask questions—they just follow orders. Unlike civilians who are prone to meetings before they can act,” Panelo said.
The extension of martial law in Mindanao, he said, will depend on the advice of the military.
The President has declared martial law in the entire Mindanao island in the aftermath of the Marawi siege.
Congress has granted the President’s request to extend martial law in Mindanao until the end of 2018 to address the terrorism threat and was also upheld by the Supreme Court.