Panelo hits Sara's removal from NSC

(UPDATE) FORMER Palace spokesman Salvador Panelo on Saturday branded as "dirty politics" the removal of Vice President Sara Duterte as a member of the National Security Council (NSC).

Panelo issued the statement after the vice president and former presidents, including her father, former president Rodrigo Duterte, were excluded from the NSC in an executive order (EO) reorganizing the presidential advisory body principally responsible for coordinating and integrating government plans and policies related to national security.

"The removal of VP Sara as member of the National Security Council is an ill-advised presidential move," Panelo said in a statement.

"It smacks of dirty politics. Another brazen measure to diminish the political star power of VP Sara," he added.

Panelo, who served as chief presidential legal counsel of former president Duterte, also claimed that removing former presidents from the NSC was just a guise to make it seem that the vice president was not the target of the body's reorganization.

"The removal of FPGMA (former president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo) and FPERAP (former president Joseph Estrada) in the NSC is to deodorize the elimination of VP Sara as [a] member — to make it appear that she is not being targeted," he said.

In a separate statement, Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin said the vice president was removed as a council member because "at the moment, the VP is not considered relevant to the responsibilities of membership in the NSC."

"EO 81 is issued to reorganize and streamline the membership of the NSC," Bersamin said.

"Nonetheless, when the need arises, the EO reserves to the president the power to add members or advisers," he added.

In EO 81, Marcos said there was a need to "further guarantee that the NSC remains a resilient national security institution, capable of adapting to evolving challenges and opportunities both domestically and internationally."

The new EO supersedes EO 33, issued by then-president Fidel Ramos in 1992 and EO 34 in 2001 by Arroyo, in which the president chairs the NSC composed of 26 other officials from the executive and legislative branches, including the vice president.

Aside from Duterte's 79-year-old father, the other living presidents who could participate in NSC meetings but are now excluded are Arroyo, 77, and Estrada, 87.

With the reorganization of the NSC, the body is now composed of the president, its chairman, the Senate president, the speaker, the Senate president pro tempore, three House deputy speakers to be designated by the speaker, the Senate and House majority and floor leaders, and the chairmen of the Senate panels on foreign relations, national defense and security, peace, unification and reconciliation, and public order and dangerous drugs.

EO 81 also removed the vice president from the NSC's executive committee.

The NSC was originally known as the Council of National Defense. It became the NSC through EO 115, issued on Dec. 24, 1986.

It acts as the principal advisory body for plans and policies relating to national security.

The removal of the two Dutertes came in the wake of Marcos' strained relations with the Duterte family.

The president had a falling out with the vice president and became the subject of a death threat by the younger Duterte.

Marcos also found himself the subject of his predecessor's accusations of alleged illegal drug use.

Following the younger Duterte's revelation that she left instructions for the murder of Marcos and his allies upon her death, the NSC said it considered all threats to the president as serious and a matter of national security.

This prompted the vice president to question why she was not invited to the NSC's meetings, where the body resolved to consider her remarks, which she said were maliciously taken out of context, as a national security issue.

The younger Duterte said her "kill" remark against Marcos, first lady Liza Araneta-Marcos, and Speaker Martin Romualdez was not a threat but only highlighted the threats to her own security.

Marcos and Vice President Duterte ran in tandem — as president and vice president, respectively — in the 2022 national elections.

National Security Adviser and National Security Council (NSC) Director General Eduardo Año defended the decision of President Marcos to reconstitute the composition of the NSC, stating that the reorganization was necessary to address evolving national security challenges.

"The NSC is, first and foremost, an advisory body to the President, and its composition is always subject to the authority of the President," Año said in a statement issued Friday evening.

Año said the president's authority to reorganize the council stems from the Administrative Code of 1987 and the Philippine Constitution, which grant the chief executive control over all executive departments, bureaus and offices.

Tracing the history of the NSC since its establishment by President Elpidio Quirino in 1950, he noted that successive administrations have restructured the council to adapt to changing conditions.