FORMER chargé d’affaires of the Philippine embassy in Baghdad Elmer G. Cato has officially assumed the role of new acting assistant secretary for Public Diplomacy of the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), the government agency announced on April 11.
A journalist-turned-diplomat, Cato assumed the position vacated in April 2017 by then-Assistant Secretary Charles Jose, who is now the country’s ambassador to Kuala Lumpur.
Before volunteering to be assigned in Iraq, Cato served in the Philippine embassy in Washington, D.C., where he held the public diplomacy portfolio from 2012 to 2015.
He was also the press officer of the Philippine Permanent Mission to the United Nations from 2003 to 2010 and the Philippine Delegation to the UN Security Council from 2004 to 2005.
Cato also served as a special assistant for media affairs of then-Foreign Secretary Domingo Siazon Jr. from 1998 to 2000, then as spokesman of the Interagency Committee on the Visiting Forces Agreement and, later, the Presidential Commission on the Visiting Forces Agreement from 1999 to 2001.
Before Cato assumed the position of DFA Communications Chief, Consul General Robespierre Bolivar, who was posted at the Philippine embassy in Tokyo, had served as acting spokesperson of the department.
There is no specific designation yet on who will be the DFA’s official spokeman. To recall, Ernesto C. Abella was earlier designated as DFA undersecretary for strategic communications.
According to Executive Director Charmaine Aviquivil of the DFA’s Office of Public Diplomacy, “[The] Secretary of Foreign Affairs [Alan Peter S. Cayetano] is the No. 1 spokesperson and will be supported by both Usec. Abella and Asec. Cato.”
A veteran journalist before passing the Foreign Service Examinations, Cato began his career in media as a 16-year-old cub reporter for Ang Pahayagang Malaya in 1983. He later became a correspondent for the Manila Chronicle, GMA News, Philippine News and Features, as well as the Union of Catholic Asia News.
Cato was also a news stringer for Reuters, the Associated Press and Kyodo News Service. Likewise, he had served as the senior desk editor of the Philippine Daily Globe, as well as the national editor of Today.
The foreign affairs department’s new acting assistant secretary was also an overseas Filipino worker, having worked for the Saudi Gazette, first as a reporter in Jeddah, then later as its Manila correspondent.
Before joining the Foreign Service in 1998, Cato was the executive editor of the Indonesian Observer in Jakarta.