Dela Rosa: A tough woman like Inday Sara can take on presidency

Senator Ronald "Bato" Dela Rosa said on Friday that he agrees to some extent with President Rodrigo Duterte that the presidency is not a woman's job given the current situation that the administration is facing.

"Basing on his context where efforts coming from the opposition, oligarchs, reds and drug syndicates (though independent and not synchronized) to bring him down are enormous, maybe I will agree with him," Dela Rosa, an ally of Duterte, said in text message to GMA News Online.

"But there are few tough women who can take on this fight and one of them is Mayor Inday Sara," he added.

On Thursday night, Duterte said he is discouraging his daughter, Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte, from running for president in the 2022 elections despite being urged by many.

"My daughter, inuudyok naman nila, sabi ko ‘My daughter is not running.’ I have told Inday not to run kasi naaawa ako sa dadaanan niya na dinaanan [ko]," Duterte said.

"Hindi ito pambabae. Alam mo the emotional setup of a woman and a man is totally different. Maging gago ka dito," he added.

A former Philippine National Police chief who led the pilot implementation of Duterte's controversial war on drugs, Dela Rosa said he sympathizes with the President on being a "loving and caring father to his daughter."

"Indeed the Presidency is the most thankless job. Take it from him," the senator said.

Mayor Duterte had earlier topped a Pulse Asia survey on possible candidates for president in the 2022 elections, but she said she was not interested and asked survey firms to exclude her in similar surveys in the future.

She also said she had no intention to run for president in the upcoming elections.

On the other hand, opposition Senator Risa Hontiveros said the women of the country will ensure that the next administration would be better after Duterte made the remark that they cannot handle the presidency.

"Filipino women have endured and overcome more than his presidency, and we will help take it back for a more worthy administration," she said. — DVM, GMA News