Former president Duterte picks ‘Mindanao card,’ bares independence movement plan

DAVAO CIT Y— Former president Rodrigo R. Duterte disclosed a plan to launch a so-called independence movement with politicians and “like-minded” political leaders in Mindanao.

“There will be a regrouping of the political arena here in Davao. It’s still in the works. [Former House Speaker Pantaleon] Alvarez will take charge of it,” he said.

Duterte added it would be a gathering yet to plan out the goal and strategy. “It would not be a party, maybe it would become a movement later,” he said.

While he did not disclose of the exact motive, Duterte said it would likely revive the independence movement initiated in the 1970’s by the late Reuben Canoy of Cagayan de Oro City.

It will be recalled Canoy formed the Mindanao Independence Movement during a period of unrest when the late strongman former president Ferdinand E. Marcos Sr. declared martial law.

It was prior to martial law that Moros in Mindanao formed the Moro National Liberation Front, and in Luzon, the Communist Party of the Philippines and its armed wing, the New People’s Army, were also established.

Duterte said the new political grouping would not be waging a rebellion although it would seek an independent Mindanao. “We will follow the United Nations’ [UN] guidelines and protocols, like gathering the signature and filing a petition with the UN,” he said.

Alvarez and Duterte said the concept would take its inspiration from Singapore when its renowned leader, the late President Lee Kuan Yew seceded the island state from Malaysia.

“Look at Singapore now, which has no resources of its own. Good governance eventually led to Singapore as a First World nation. It would have remained a Third World country when it stayed with Malaysia.”

Drop PI, everything will be fine

DUTERTE also advised President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. to “just drop” any move to amend the Charter “and happy days are here again.”

“You just stop,” Duterte said when asked about his tirades against President Marcos, First Lady Liza Araneta-marcos and House Speaker Martin Romualdez, who Duterte said were the triumvirate in the controversial

People’s Initiative (PI), the first step to move for the amendment or revision of the 1987 Constitution.

He said there should be no quarrel with the President, even among the Marcos siblings, “because…the President is a good man, a man who could not even kill a fly.”

However, he admonished the Marcoses to acknowledge, “They should feel blessed that God gave them a chance to be there in Malacañang, but only briefly, to redeem [the Marcos name].”

Drug use

DUTERTE also reacted to Marcos’ statement about his Fentanyl pain killer medication use, saying, “I’ve already stopped that eight or seven years ago immediately after I came out from surgery from a shoulder back pain.”

“It was prescribed by my attending physicians and they also prescribed to stop it after surgery,” he told a news briefing he called on Tuesday night at a downtown hotel.

Duterte said it was understandable for the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) to deny about the illegal drug use of Marcos. “If you are the PDEA, would you show the derogatory record to the President?”

Duterte said the PDEA list containing Marcos’ name may have been set aside “but I know the military always keep a record of it for their protection also.”

“It is just there. I will try to find it again because I did not accept it. When that will come to my hand, I will present it. Don’t worry, just wait,” Duterte said.

He dismissed the threats hurled by persistent critic, former senator Antonio Trillanes IV, about the alleged interviews conducted in the country by investigators of the International Criminal Court. “Don’t mind him. No one listens to him, not even from the military.”

“He [Trillanes] is what is called a simpleton. He is the typical of what the Tagalog say na ‘torpe,’” Duterte added. “Ask the military, he is like an expelled member because of what he did to Reyes [the late Defense Secretary Angelo Reyes] whom he shamed publicly [to a point] he committed suicide. Do you think that sits well with the Pmaers?”

Duterte continued: “He thought he was doing a heroic act. You lead a mutiny only to surrender to the police. I thought you were brave and ready to die there?”