MANILA: President Duterte may have shun media interviews, but he is planning to interact with public through his own nationwide radio-TV program, a free weekly newspaper and the social media.
He also plans to open pioneering TV channels for Muslims and the lumads, Inquirer quoted Presidential Communications Office (PCO) Secretary Martin Andanar as saying.
Duterte has big ideas for the government’s TV station PTV 4 as well, which includes changing its charter and giving it “editorial independence,” Andanar added.
For a start, the communications team will convert the former Davao City mayor’s weekly TV show, “Gikan sa Masa, Para sa Masa” into a nationwide TV program renamed, “Mula sa Masa, Para sa Masa.”
The original Davao broadcast used to air on Sundays and offered Duterte’s take on pressing issues of the day, the report said.
“It’s not just a television program, it’s going to be on radio as well,” Andanar said of the show that will be broadcast in Filipino. Online and social media platforms will also be tapped, the communications official was quoted as saying.
Like former President Joseph Estrada, Duterte will have his own weekly newsletter, a tabloid that will be distributed for free, Andanar added.
Presidential spokesperson Ernesto Abella reportedly said the team was putting up as well a website where the public can send in questions to the Chief Executive.
“We’ll sort out those questions and answer those we can ably respond to,” Abella said.
For complaints, the 24-hour 8888 number was expected to be up and running next month, along with the 911 emergency hotline, Inquirer quoted Andanar.
To widen the reach of the government network, the communications chief reportedly unveiled plans to put up a Muslim channel and a lumad or indigenous peoples’ channel, which dovetail with the plan to establish a government broadcast hub in Mindanao.
