President Rodrigo Duterte has appointed officers-in-charge at the Department of Health and the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), Malacañang said on Thursday.

Palace spokesman Ernesto Abella said Duterte named Health Undersecretary Herminigildo Valle to take the post vacated by Secretary Paulyn Jean Rosell-Ubial, whose appointment was rejected by the Commission on Appointments (CA).

Valle currently oversees the DoH’s Office for Field Implementation Management.





Abella, in a news briefing, said DICT Undersecretary Eliseo Mijares Rio Jr. was designated OIC. He will replace Secretary Rodolfo Salima who resigned.

Rio, a former general in the Armed Forces of the Philippines and chairman of the National Telecommunications Commission, is DICT’s undersecretary for special concerns.

Duterte named Valle and Rio as OICs through separate memos issued by Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea, “effective immediately.”

The memos were signed on Tuesday, October 10, and were released to the media on Thursday.