Undersecretary Anneli R. Lontoc, CESO I studied and received her B.S. in Business Administration from the University of the Philippines, Diliman in 1982, the Master of Arts in Urban and Regional Planning, from the same university in 1996, the Master in Public Administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, Cambridge, U.S.A. in 2013, where she was also an Edward Mason Program Fellow in Public Policy and Management, and currently a candidate Ph.D. in Urban and Regional Planning in the School of Urban and Regional Planning, University of the Philippines, Diliman.
In between those degrees, she received Post-graduate Diploma in Regional Development Planning and Management from Universitaet Dortmund – Spring Center, Dortmund, Germany in 1994, and Post-graduate Diploma from the Netherlands International Institute for Management Science, Delft, The Netherlands in 1988.
She has clocked in more than 40 years of public service. She rose from the ranks in the Department of Trade and Industry where she started to work as industry researcher in 1982, providing start-ups and SMEs, technical assistance in the management of their enterprise.
In 1990, she became the first Provincial Director of the DTI Provincial Office in Baler, Aurora, and later on became the Assistant Regional Director of DTI in the National Capital Region, In 2001, she transitioned from regional operations work to national-level project implementation when she became Assistant Secretary at the Office of the President’s Priority and ODA-funded Projects Office, and led the launching of the RORO Project, then called the Strong Republic Nautical Highway (SRNH).
After her introduction to transportation sector, she was appointed in 2003, as the first female Assistant Secretary to head the Land Transportation Office, where she introduced total quality management system in its frontline services, drivers’ licensing centers in malls, and streamlined the driver’s licensing process and had it ISO 9001 certified.
In 2006, she was appointed as an Undersecretary of the Department of Transportation and Communication and designated as the Undersecretary for the Road Transport Sector. She led several inter-agency multi-sectoral teams in developing policies, plans and programs for the transportation sector, the latest and most notable of which was the Public Utility Vehicle Modernization Program (PUVMP) in 2017.
She was also designated as Acting Secretary of the then, Department of Transportation and Communication (DOTC), during the transition of leadership in government in 2010.
She also served as Senior Research/Teaching Fellow, at the University of the Philippines’ School of Urban and Regional Planning (SURP), where she co-taught Planning Workshop and Transportation Policies and Planning Practices last 2013-2016. Further, she also was also on special assignment at the House of Representatives’ as Deputy Secretary General under the Office of Speaker Gloria Macapagal Arroyo in 2018-2019.
In 2017, she was assigned to establish the Philippine Railways Institute (PRI) in support of the railway development under the Build, Build, Build Program. Thus, she led the formulation of its concept paper, the operational plan, the institutional framework including the legal requirements, the organizational structure and the budgetary requirements, and currently as head of PRI, she manages the day-to-day operation of the Institute, and plans programs and projects to realize its vision and deliver its mandate to the railway transportation sector and the Filipino people.
