Roque: Calls for Duterte-Duterte 2022 ticket not from gov’t

Calls for a Duterte-Duterte tandem in the 2022 presidential polls are not from the Duterte administration, presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said Friday.

Roque was referring to a ticket where Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte runs for President with her father, President Rodrigo Duterte, as her running mate.

“Hindi po galing sa gobyerno yang Duterte-Duterte,” Roque said at a Palace briefing.

(That did not come from the government.)

Roque said that an expression of a personal opinion should not be construed as an official position.

“Kung merong mga taong gobyerno na nag-e-express, ‘yan po ay personal na opinyon po nila,” he said.

(Those people from the government who are for that, that would be their opinion.) 

Roque said the President’s marching orders is to address the raging COVID-19 pandemic which already left over 12,000 people dead and over four million jobless.

The President, however, already called his long time aid and Senator Bong Go as President thrice this month alone and has asked Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III if the latter wants to run for a Senate seat.

Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo floated a Duterte-Duterte tandem last year, while a faction of the President's PDP-Laban party is also in favor of the President running for vice president in May 2022.

Senator Panfilo Lacson also said on Friday that the country is not ready for a Duterte-Duterte leadership which would be a de-facto Davao city governance.

President Duterte’s term ends on June 30, 2022. — RSJ, GMA News