ROBREDO BADLY NEEDS GRACEFUL EXIT

In just a few more months, the political campaign for the May 2022 elections will begin. Right now, the focus of public speculation is the presidency and the vice presidency.

The first major political party to create a stir is the ruling PDP-Laban party led by President Rodrigo Roa Duterte. At its recent caucus organized by Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi, the party bigwigs called on President Duterte to run for Vice President in the coming elections. Party leaders confirm that the Constitution does not prohibit a sitting President from running for Vice President.

Party leaders also called on President Duterte’s daughter, the no-nonsense Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte, to run for President.

Although President Duterte has not made any public revelation of what he has in mind, Albay Representative Joey Salceda confidently says that Sara will accept the party’s endorsement.

As expected, the talking heads of the disgraced Liberal Party of ex-President Noynoy Aquino created a big fuss about the potential Duterte-Duterte ticket.

For Vice President Leni Robredo, a Duterte-Duterte ticket is absolutely unacceptable. She claimed that the Filipino people do not want another Duterte in power, and demanded that the electorate elect the next President from the political opposition.

Robredo added that for the opposition to win the presidency, they should field only one candidate to run for President against the administration bet.

She quickly added a disclaimer, though, by saying that the sole opposition candidate for President need not be her.

Robredo’s announcement reveals much about her, and the political realities she is aware of but which she refuses to admit in public.

First, Robredo is undoubtedly irrelevant.

So far, there are public speculations about prize fighter turned legislator, Senator Manny Pacquiao, eyeing the presidency, a goal he has managed to deny to date by saying he is more concerned about the Covid-19 pandemic than politics.

The ongoing maritime conflict in the West Philippine Sea between the Philippines and China has provided the politically ambitious and opportunistically equivocal ex-Supreme Court Justice Antonio Carpio a free chance to thrust himself in the political limelight and offer himself to

“Party leaders confirm that the Constitution does not prohibit a sitting President from running for Vice President.

“Having done nothing substantial during her five and a half years as Vice President, Robredo is now seen by many as irrelevant.

the electorate as a possible presidential candidate in next year’s polls, notwithstanding the many political skeletons he has in his closet.

For a time, there were news reports about Carpio’s new political party, the so-called 1Sambayan, which he recently organized with the Noynoy Aquino-era delusional duo of ex-Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert del Rosario and retired Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales.

Nobody, however, has been talking about Robredo as a viable candidate for President in 2022. Having done nothing substantial during her five and a half years as Vice President, Robredo is now seen by many as irrelevant. Precisely because she knows she is irrelevant, Robredo exploits every opportunity to look relevant, including making unfounded remarks against continuing the Duterte brand of leadership for another six-year term.

Next, Robredo is still dreaming. Robredo still hopes that by some major miracle, she will get anointed as the choice of the political opposition in the 2022 presidential derby. Well, she was lucky enough to become Vice President, and so she thinks she can be lucky enough to fool the political opposition into endorsing her. Dream on, Leni! Finally, Robredo badly needs a graceful exit. Robredo knows that her moribund Liberal Party cannot deliver the votes she will need if she runs for President. Just look at what happened to their Otso Diretso ticket which was completely clobbered in the 2019 midterm elections. The more presidential bets there will be in 2022, the greater the likelihood of her losing miserably.

Her call for a single opposition candidate for President may sound practical, but it is also a veiled admission by her that she will lose if she runs for President against other presidential wannabes.

At the end of the day, if the political opposition does follow Robredo’s suggestion and fields somebody else, and not her, for its solitary presidential bet, then Robredo will have a convenient excuse not to run for President anymore, on the fanciful reasoning that she does not want to divide whatever minimal votes the political opposition can still count on.