“My promise to you is we will do our best to protect what you have helped to build in IIT”.
This is what Chancellor Alizedney M. Ditucalan told outgoing Vice Chancellor for Administration and Finance Dr. Polaus M. Bari who retired January 28, 2023.
During last week’s turnover ceremony, and before key officials, faculty and staff of the University, Ditucalan thanked Dr. Bari “for inspiring excellence in the university”.
Dr. Bari handed over the stewardship of the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Administration and Finance (OVCAF) on January 25, 2023, to Atty. Yaslani Bantuas, head of the Accounting Division, in a ceremony held at the University’s Mini-Theater.
Bari said that he was thankful to have worked and served MSU-IIT. Bari had been the longest-serving Vice Chancellor – having served three chancellors during his employment in the University.
In response, incoming VCAF Bantuas accepted the challenge, feeling glad and excited to assume a new and huge responsibility. During his acceptance speech, he shared four fundamentals he believed that he will carry on as he takes on the VCAF role.
According to the new VCAF, “no one has the monopoly on knowledge, and an individual’s perspective will never be dominant to another person’s perception.” He said balancing everyone’s perception, interactive and constant communication, and reconciliation are indispensable in achieving goals and targets.
Bantuas, both an accountant and lawyer, envisions financial freedom vis-a-vis financial resiliency in the University. He also believes that the law is an instrument to be used to foster change, sustainability, and growth, and it should be a framework to facilitate decision-making in the University.
Thirdly, he emphasized the need to strengthen and widen the understanding of the public service values of patriotism, integrity, excellence, and spirituality as mandated by the Civil Service Commission.
Lastly, he mentioned that ethics and morality are the keys to influencing the future. He said that ethics is an essential element in leadership and that rejections should be perceived as redirection, personal failures as lessons learned.
Bantuas’s stint as VCAF starts January 30, 2023.