PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte and his special assistant Christopher Go received Rolex watches as gifts from a large agricultural company but they returned them, Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol said Friday.
“It wasn’t only me,” Piñol said in a television interview.
“President Duterte ribbed me about it, but in fact he was also given a Rolex that he also returned. Secretary Bong Go did the same thing.”
Piñol said last month he rejected a gift box containing a Rolex watch worth P450,000 that was given to him during a dinner tendered by the top officials of the agriculture company, but he rejected it because of the government’s “no-gift policy.”
He said he was “just following the example of the President” when he refused to accept the watch.
He said he could not take the gift “not only because the company is involved in activities that require the supervision of the Department that I head, but also because the law prohibits officials like me from accepting expensive gifts.”
