President Ferdinand “Bongbong” R. Marcos Jr. administered the oath to former Senator Juan Edgardo “Sonny” Angara as the new Secretary of the Department of Education (DepEd) in a ceremony held on Friday at Malacañang.

“I have just administered the oath to our good friend here, Secretary Sonny Angara, for his new position in the Department of Education. That formalizes his taking on the position of Secretary for DepEd,” Marcos said.

Before Angara took his oath, Marcos said they had some discussions on running the education department.

“We are looking forward to many good things to come from this appointment. We had some discussions before he took his oath to give ourselves a good idea of what we think needs to be done,” he said.

Best of friends

On 2 July, Marcos named Angara the new DepEd chief exactly two weeks after Vice President Sara Duterte left her post in the department on 19 June.

“I know Sonny knows what is important and I know that he knows how to get these things done, and so I’m very optimistic for DepEd,” Marcos said.

On Thursday, Duterte officially turned over the position to Angara in a ceremony at the DepEd headquarters in Pasig City.

Angara expressed how much he values the country’s education system “much as every Filipino family does.”

“I’m extremely grateful to our President for entrusting me with this important task to lead a very important department, to use the President’s words,” he said.

Angara said he is looking forward to working very closely with Marcos “in the coming days and months for the needed reforms in our educational system, for the benefit of our young learners, for the benefit of future generations.”