1Sambayan to announce presidential bet for Eleksyon 2022 on Sept. 30

Opposition coalition 1Sambayan said Friday it would announce its presidential candidate for the May 2022 elections on September 30, a day before the week-long filing of candidacy papers for national positions.

Retired Supreme Court Justice Antonio Carpio said they are screening potential nominees with the help of surveys and an assessment of the person's track record, competence, integrity, patriotism, and vision for the country.

“For 1Sambayan, our target date to announce our presidential candidate is the end of this month. But of course something might come out like there might be a rush of renewed hope for a unity ticket. So anything can still happen. It may go beyond September 30, but our original target date is September 30,” Carpio, the coalition’s lead convenor, said in an online forum.

Carpio said that “unity talks” would continue even after some personalities had already announced their presidential ambitions.

“It’s still ongoing. Nothing is fixed in stone,” he said.

He said Vice President Leni Robredo, Manila Mayor Isko Moreno, and former Senator Antonio Trillanes IV have agreed to submit to the selection process.

“But we are also including in our survey those who have not accepted, like (Senators) Manny Pacquiao and Ping Lacson, because they have announced (their candidacy for president) and we are precisely consulting our members,” Carpio said.

“We are not excluding anyone. If our members say we want someone out of these five, it’s OK with us, because this is a consultation. Of course the results of the internal survey will be combined with the results of the SWS, Pulse Asia surveys, but that is just one criteria.”

Carpio believes that the opposition would have better chances of winning the election if there were fewer candidates.

“I think we have better chances if there will be only three. But if there are two then I think we will most likely win if there are only two candidates. The game is not over at all if there are three or four candidates because in the last election we had five candidates for the vice presidency, including (former Senator) Bongbong Marcos, and he lost,” he said.

Launched in March, 1Sambayan is composed of “pro-democracy” groups and personalities aiming to field a single opposition slate of national candidates — president, vice president, 12 senators — who will square off against President Rodrigo Duterte’s bets.

Duterte has declared that he is running for vice president next year.—AOL, GMA News