Department of Education (DepEd) Secretary Leonor Briones is facing the Commission on Appointments (CA) led by Senator Bam Aquino.
Her health was among those raised by lawmakers as they deliberate on the nomination of the 76-year-old cabinet member.
“I use a wheelchair whenever I travel by plane, but there is no correlation between the state of my knees and the state of my brain,” she told the CA.
She also assured the panel that she has no capacity for corruption.
CA members also asked the secretary on her stand on family planning.
Briones said DepEd will not play a role in the condom distribution program of the Department of Health.
She explained that there is no law or Executive Order that mandates DepEd to do this.
At the hearing, Briones also noted that what students learn in school is irrelevant to survival.
She said education must be able to lift people’s lives from poverty.
“We have to make education truly liberating,” she stressed.
