FORMER Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Lucas Bersamin, has been appointed by President Ferdinand ‘Bongbong’ Marcos Jr., as his new Executive Secretary, more than a week after the position was vacated by Atty. Victor Rodriguez, who is now the President’s Chief of Staff.
Press Secretary Atty. Trixie Cruz-Angeles, in a statement to the media, said Bersamin 72, took his oath of office before PBBM on Tuesday, September 27, 2022, and immediately buckled down to work by attending the Cabinet meeting scheduled on the same day.
Mainstream media erroneously reported that Bersamin took over from Rodriguez last September 17, 2022, the day Rodriguez tendered his resignation and assumed his new post as PCOS.
As an executive secretary, Bersamin will be referred to as the “Little President” who is mandated to “directly assist the President in the management of affairs of the government as well as to direct the operations of the Executive Office,” according to the Official Gazette.
Bersamin, who was Chief Justice from November 2018 until his retirement in October 2019, was the chairman of the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) after being Pres. Rodrigo Roa Duterte in 2020.
A graduate of the University of the East, Bersamin, a native of Abra province, placed ninth in the 1973 bar examinations.
He was also trial court judge in Quezon City before being appointed as associate justice at the Court of Appeals (CA) in 2003. Six years later, in 2009, he was promoted as associate justice of the Supreme Court.