CAUAYAN CITY, Isabela—Exactly a year after Filipinos voted for President Rodrigo R. Duterte, who ran on the platform of shifting the government to a federal system, the national campaign being spearheaded by the Department of the Interior and Local Government has reached the Queen Province of the North.
More than a thousand students, college instructors, local officials, and residents trooped to the gymnasium of the Isabela State University campus here to listen to the presentations of the People’s National Movement for Federalism or PENAMFED.
DILG Undersecretary Emily O. Padilla, in charge of Legislative Liaison, Public Affairs, and Special Concerns, outlined President Duterte’s programs and the role of federalism as “an implementing mechanism to address the concerns of ending corruption and enhancing services, ending the drug menace which has resulted to dysfunctional families.”
Dindi Tan, a former college professor from La Union who works with Padilla, spoke in native Ilokano to lecture on the basic concepts of federalism. She defined it as “the sharing of powers from top to bottom, to level the playing field of development at the local level.”
Also present at the event dubbed as “Pederalismo Para Sa Kinabukasan” are Freddie Uy, MRRD-NECC-PENAMFED regional chairperson, and several Provincial Board members such as RicJay Angubong, Manuel Alejandro, and Randy Arriola.