President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo is expected to embark on a Cabinet revamp this week given the imminent departure of several Cabinet members eyeing public office in next year’s elections.

Deputy Presidential Spokeswoman Lorelei Fajardo said the President would announce in the coming days the replacements of Cabinet members who would file their certificate of candidacies this week.

The President is scheduled to hold a Cabinet meeting in Boracay today, probably the last for her officials planning to run for national and local positions in the 2010 polls. The filing of certificate of candidacy will end on December 1.

“We expect that some Cabinet members would already be filing their candidacy so automatically they are already deemed resigned. Probably we could hear new appointments
in the next few days,” Fajardo said in a press briefing at the Palace.

Fajardo said Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap, Cabinet Secretary Silvestre Bello III, Presidential Management Staff chief Hermogenes Esperon Jr, Energy Secretary Angelo Reyes, and Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) chairman Augusto Syjuco are among the Cabinet members who may soon leave the Cabinet to chase their political ambitions.

She said Health Secretary Francisco Duque is still undecided if he will run for public office next year. Duque is being groomed as one of the administration senatorial candidates but the health chief is reportedly considering a congressional sat in his home province of Pangasinan.

Even Fajardo may be reappointed to a higher position in the Cabinet, according to Press Secretary Cerge Remonde.

Fajardo said she is “flattered” to hear that she is being considered for another position but would rather wait for the President’s decision.

“As of now, I am still the Presidential Assistant for Central Luzon. I do not just serve as a spokesperson under the Office of the President so I would wholeheartedly accept whatever the President would deem appropriate based on the capacity that I have,” she said.

Fajardo was supposed to replace Anthony Golez as Press Undersecretary but she is reportedly being groomed to a higher portfolio. Golez resigned as one of the President's deputy spokespersons to run for congressman in Bacolod City under the Nationalist People's Coalition.

In this Tuesday’s Cabinet assembly, the President will discuss rehabilitation works in typhoon-hit provinces, the country's economic prospects, and updates on State of the Nation Address (SONA) projects, according to Remonde.