- Harry Roque, Kabayan representative, is the new spokesman President Duterte.
- Roque will be attending the first Cabinet meeting on November 6.
- Roque was also endorsed for the 2019 Senatorial Elections.
President Rodrigo Duterte announced that Harry Roque will replace Ernesto Abella as the Presidential Spokesperson last Friday, October 27. Duterte even noted that Roque will attend the first Cabinet meeting on November 6 to make his entrance more dramatic.
In a speech last October 22, Duterte endorsed Roque for the 2019 Senatorial Elections. He also remarked that Roque had been campaigning even before the president filed his candidacy. Roque as the House Deputy Minority Leader was known as a human right lawyer who represented the victims from the 2009 Maguindanao massacre, the relative of Gerry Ortega who was gunned down in 2011 and the family of Filipino transgender Jennifer Laude who was killed by a U.S. Marine in 2014.
Roque replaced Ernesto Abella, a former pastor and social entrepreneur. Abella met with then Davao City Mayor Duterte when he was kidnapped by bandits in 1996. Abella was freed after 24 hours when Duterte asked for help from Moro National Liberation Front Leaders.
Roque received his Master of Laws with Merits from the London School of Economics in 1996, Bachelor of Laws from University of the Philippines in 1990 and Bachelor of Arts (Economics and Political Science) from the University of Michigan Ann Arbor in 1986. He taught law in the University of the Philippines and teaching constitutional law and public international law for the past 15 years.
