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Ex-Duterte appointee itinalaga sa PAOCC
Marcos names new SSS president
President Marcos has appointed former Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) President and General Manager Rolando Ledesma Macasaet as acting president and chief executive officer of the Social Security System (SSS).
The Presidential Communications Office said that Macasaet took his oath before Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin in Malacañang on Thursday. He replaced Michael Gonzales Regino who was appointed by then President Rodrigo Duterte in March 2022.
In 2018, Macasaet replaced Francisco Duque III as GSIS chair. Before joining the country’s biggest state-run pension fund, he was a member of San Miguel Corp.’s board of directors. The SSS is set to increase its contribution from 13 percent to 14 percent starting this month under Republic Act No. 11199, or the Social Security Act of 2018. Under the law, the contribution rate will increase by 1 percent every two years until it reaches 15 percent by 2025.
The SSS earlier said that employers would shoulder the increase while individual paying members, such as self-employed, nonworking spouses and overseas Filipino workers, would shoulder the additional contribution. —NESTOR CORRALES
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Marcos puts Centino back as AFP chief; Bacarro out
In a surprise move, President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. has reappointed Gen. Andres Centino as chief of staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines.
In August last year, Marcos named Lt. Gen. Bartolome Bacarro as his first AFP chief, replacing Centino who held the post from Nov. 12, 2021 (still under the Duterte administration) to Aug. 8, 2022. But on Friday, Press Undersecretary Cheloy Velicaria-Garafil announced that Marcos had again tapped Centino to head the military.
There was no immediate explanation from Malacañang for the replacement of Bacarro and the return of Centino, who would be retiring from the service this February.
Prior to being the AFP chief, Centino was the commanding general of the Philippine Army from May 14, 2021, to Dec. 10, 2021.
He previously served as commander of the Army’s 4th Infantry Division, deputy chief of staff for operations (J3), and commander of the 401st Infantry Brigade.
Other credentials
A cum laude graduate of the Philippine Military Academy (Class of 1988), Centino also holds a master’s degree in business management from the University of the Philippines, a master’s degree in national resource strategy from the National Defense University in Washington, and a certificate from the Strategic Business Economic Program of the University of Asia and the Pacific. Citing his other credentials, Velicaria-Garafil said Centino “implemented four major thrusts within the (AFP) — operational efficiency, optimal use of resources, advancement of professionalism and meritocracy within the organization, and capability development.” Under his leadership, the AFP “successfully launched military campaigns” against communist rebels and local terrorist groups, she added.
Under Republic Act No. 11709, or “An Act Strengthening Professionalism and Promoting the Continuity of Policies and Modernization Initiatives in the Armed Forces of the Philippines” that took effect on July 1, 2022, the AFP chief serves a fixed, three-year term “unless sooner terminated by the President.”
In August last year, then Press Secretary Trixie Cruz-Angeles noted in a statement that “based on RA 11709, Gen. Bacarro will be the first (AFP chief) to be given a fixed three-year term.”