By Junex Doronio
MANILA — In what seemingly looks like children’s play “the boat is sinking,” the Department of Finance under Secretary Benjamin E. Diokno is now being rocked by successive resignations of its undersecretaries.
On Saturday, the 16th of September 2023, Finance Undersecretary Cielo Magno, who led the Department of Finance’s (DOF) Fiscal Policy and Monitoring Group (FPMG), will officially step down.
Magno’s resignation came on the heels of the earlier departures of two other DOF undersecretaries Mark Dennis Joven and Antonette Tionko.
Joven and Tionko were originally appointed during the Duterte administration by then Finance Secretary Carlos “Sonny” Dominguez III.
They were retained by Diokno before their eventual resignations for uncertain reasons.
In the case of Magno, sources said no less than Diokno asked her to resign.
Why?
Sources told MNM that one of the reasons could be her continued public support for former Vice President Leni Robredo, who ran against President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. in the previous year’s presidential elections.
It was learned that before joining the DOF, Magno was an associate professor at the University of the Philippines (UP) School of Economics.
She played a pivotal role as the focal point person for the Philippine Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (PH-EITI).
That initiative was initially shelved during the tenure of Dominguez but was subsequently reinstated under Diokno’s leadership.
As a DOF undersecretary, Magno also chaired the technical committee of the Fiscal Incentives Review Board and the inter-agency Investment Promotion Coordination Technical Committee.
Diokno could not be reached as of this posting.
(ai/mnm)
