Your Excellencies
Fellow workers in government
Dear friends

Last December, the honor and challenge of leadership at the Department of Foreign Affairs fell unexpectedly on me.  I knew immediately that I had to live up to the trust given to me by President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.  I also had to fill in the sudden void and profound legacy left by Secretary Blas F. Ople, in whose work and wisdom I have found much inspiration.

As a career officer, I felt the need to get my bearings and respond as best as I could.  I decided to begin by doing a personal review of our foreign policy, to better understand where we were and to best know how to get where we wanted to go.  This I did with a series of briefings which begun early this year with an overview of foreign policy thrusts of this government.
 
Philippine foreign policy under the Administration of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has been marked by a clear determination to make foreign policy work directly to the benefit of our people.

Many of your will agree that the usual abstract notions and clichés had no place in the President’s foreign policy.  The President’s vision was a foreign policy that was relevant to the nation and its people.  It was a vision that called relevance with direct impact on the lives of the 82 million Filipinos.

Bold decisions were taken, decisions that were at times unpopular.  Principled actions were taken with nothing else but the welfare and well being of the nation and its people in mind, regardless of, at times what were perceived as, the domestic political costs.

These were decisions and actions that could only be taken by a leader with experience and vision, by a leader who had a meaningful understanding of the world, by a leader dedicated to doing what was best for the nation.

I first presented these thoughts when I gave a lecture on Philippine foreign policy at the Third University of the Philippines Public Lecture Series on the Philippine Presidency and Administration at the UP Faculty Center Conference Hall on 23 February 2004.  This was a series of performance reports to the academe and the public which culminated in the President’s final presentation for the U.P. Public Lecture Series entitled “A Choice Between Two Futures” delivered at the Malacanang Heroes Hall on 18 March 2004.

After more reflection and fueled by the positive response I received from that lecture, I decided to publish a short work that embodies my appreciation, analysis and perspectives on Philippine foreign policy.

Today I would like to share with you this monograph, “Relevance and Change:  Foreign Policy Under the Administration of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.”

Thank you.