Energy chief Raphael Lotilla has been selected by Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr as the next secretary of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), the president’s executive secretary said on Friday.
Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin announced the changes in a press conference, after Marcos had asked all his cabinet secretaries to resign following the government’s disappointing performance in the mid-term elections last week in the wake of falling approval ratings.
Environment secretary Toni Yulo-Loyzaga will be taking a temporary break while the president considers a new role for her, said Bersamin.
Before Lotilla was appointed as secretary of energy under Marcos, Jr’s administration, he was an independent director of Aboitiz Power and Exenor, an oil and gas exploration company. He also served as chairman of the Philippine Electricity Market Corporation and Philippine National Oil Company.
His ties with the fossil fuel industry “ring alarm bells”, said Power for People Coalition (P4P), a network of civil society organisations, communities and cooperatives that rally against pollutive fuels.
“The DENR is the frontline agency tasked with ensuring environmental compliance for destructive energy projects. Secretary Lotilla should brace himself for the highest standard of accountability from fossil fuel-affected communities, consumers, and environmental advocates alike. We would allow no compromise at this time of intensifying climate crisis and ecological degradation,” P4P said in a statement.
Greenpeace Southeast Asia director Jasper Inventor also noted how his record at the Department of Energy was marked by moves to enable “dangerous” nuclear energy, promote fossil gas, and reverse the moratorium on coal-fired power plants.
“We challenge Secretary Lotilla to leave behind these old interests, turn a new page under his new mandate, and work to reverse the pro-nuclear and pro-fossil fuel stance of the administration,” said Inventor.
Lotilla previously served as energy secretary from 2005 to 2007 under former Philippine president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo’s administration. He was also undersecretary at the National Economic and Development Authority, was an adviser to the Senate and the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, and contributed to the Legislative-Executive Development Advisory Council. His key reform bill is the Electric Power Industry Reform Act of 2001, which privatised the entire supply chain of the power sector.
Apart from his long career in public service, Lotilla was the executive director of Partnerships in Environmental Management for the Seas of East Asia, an international organisation for coastal and ocean governance as well as a professor of law at the University of the Philippines and the Asian Institute of Management.
He enters the environment department at a time when the Philippines plays a crucial role in global climate talks. He is expected to lead the country as it acts as host to the board of the loss and damage climate fund, as well as prepares the government to update its nationally determined contributions (NDCs) ahead of the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP30) in Belém, Brazil. As of May, only 22 countries have submitted new NDCs, with the Philippines yet to present one.
On the homefront, he is expected to direct new policies such as a recently-approved law which will require the government to report its economic contribution of natural resources. He will also take over the execution of a roadmap that the department has laid down to tap carbon credits to unlock financing, such as through carbon dioxide captured by the oceans, following the operationalisation of Article 6 at the COP29 climate summit in Baku, Azerbaijan last November.
Once he formally assumes the position, Lotilla must ensure that the DENR can help sustain ongoing climate initiatives on all aspects, not just on mitigation, said John Leo Algo, national coordinator of Aksyon Klima Pilipinas, a nonprofit network of 40 civil society organisations.
Algo said: “With these initiatives already underway, Lotilla is under pressure to ensure that all climate-related actions under the DENR receive enough attention, resources, and manpower to ensure that no one, ecosystems or communities, is left behind in achieving Philippine climate and environmental targets, in aid of genuine sustainable development.”
