Senator Francis Escudero urged President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. on Monday, Sept. 25, to assign a ‘permanent’ instead of a ‘part-time’ Department of Agriculture (DA) secretary.

In a report by RH Raymund Dadpaas, Escudero said there was nothing wrong with Marcos’ intentions to helm the DA, but the president cannot handle juggling it along with the many tasks he should attend to.

Escudero also called for government action with the cotinuous issue of smuggled rice, seeking for the names of the perpetrators involved in the hoarded rice deals instead of only naming the trading companies.

“Why is it that up to now I have yet to hear a name that is responsible for the hoarding of the rice that the Bureau of Customs (BOC) has raided. And why is it that not a single case has been filed against individuals,” he said in a plenary session on Wednesday, Sept. 20.

Sen. Cynthia Villar confirmed in a plenary session to amend the Anti-Agricultural Smuggling Act of 2016 earlier that only the trading companies’ names were submitted to her by the BOC.

Escudero said this was puzzling since one cannot file a criminal case against companies but only cancel their registration unlike individuals who can be arrested.