Albay 2nd district Rep. Joey Salceda (left), Vice President Sara Duterte (Facebook)

Vice President Sara Duterte's pal in the House of Representatives, Albay 2nd district Rep. Joey Salceda, has two specific names in mind as to who should be the next Department of Education (DepEd) secretary. 

Salceda, in a statement Friday, June 21, identified the two as Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) Chairperson Prospero de Vera and Synergeia Foundation head Milwida “Nene” Guevara. 

“I have two names in mind for Secretary: Popoy de Vera and Nene Guevara. Few have ever had an impact on the education sector as large as the impact these two people have had on the sector,” he said. 

On Wednesday, June 19, Vice President Duterte personally tendered her resignation as DepEd chief in Malacañang. She served at the helm of the agency for two years. 

Salceda went on to justify his recommendation for De Vera and Guevara for the position vacated by the lady official. “It will be wise of PBBM (President Marcos) to choose from these two. They’re the strongest hands in education,” he said. 

Salceda said that De Vera’s push for funding for community colleges under the Universal Access to Quality Tertiary Education (UAQTE) program “helped poor and underserved communities produce more college graduates than ever before". 

UAQTE, or the Free College Tuition Law, was principally authored by the Bicol congressman. 

“That changed the landscape for basic education because most community colleges produce teachers. Chair Popoy has also streamlined linkages between DepEd and CHEd in offering basic education programs,” he said. 

“We also worked together in keeping proprietary private schools alive during the pandemic. As many as 140,000 basic education students in private colleges for low-income communities would have been kicked out of the system without our tax reduction policies and the subsidies we pushed for,” he added. 

Meanwhile, Salceda hailed Guevara as the one who was “responsible for highlighting the structural defects of the education system and what needs to be done". 

“No one has been earlier and more consistent about the longstanding issues affecting basic education. It’s Nene Guevara,” he noted. 

“Synergeia Foundation has also been the loudest about convening EDCOM II. Before our PISA results were a problem, Nene Guevara has already been pointing out the issues underlying basic education,” the chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means further said. 

At any rate. Salceda says that the DepEd post "is too important to be left vacant for long".