Presidential Communications Office (PCO) Undersecretary Claire Castro on Monday confirmed that Acting Secretary Jay Ruiz is in the process of divesting his interests in his media company in compliance with a 60-day requirement following his appointment.
“To my knowledge, he is preparing his papers to divest,” Castro said, adding that any conflict of interest must be eliminated now that the Secretary has taken office.
“If his businesses were established before his appointment, that’s one matter, but any conflicting interests now must be removed,” she added.
Castro was also asked about allegations of a conflict of interest and earlier remarks by Ruiz concerning leakages within the PCO.
“Maybe he’s the one who should answer that properly; I didn’t catch what he meant,” she said.
“If his businesses were established before he was appointed as Secretary of PCO, then we do not see anything wrong there because he also needs to earn,” Castro added.
In a statement after the prescon, the PCO said the story about the joint venture (JV) between IBC-13 and Digital8, Inc. that appeared on the Politiko website on March 2, 2025 is “false, inaccurate and misleading.”
“Secretary Jay Ruiz was not an incorporator or director of Digital8, and has never owned any shares in the company. He was merely Digital8’s authorized representative to the jopint venture agreement due to his position as head of its sales and marketing,” it said.
“The JV won the contract through competitive public bidding in October 2024, in full compliance with all rules, regulations and laws pertaining to public bidding,” the PCO said.
The Politiko report claimed that Digital 8, Inc. is a media company co-founded by Ruiz which won a contract worth more than P206 million with the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office for airing lotto draws on state-run IBC 13 in the last quarter of 2024.
