Carpio: We can't allow another Duterte to run Philippines

Retired Supreme Court Justice Antonio Carpio said Wednesday it would be the “height of a political dynasty” if President Rodrigo Duterte will allow his daughter, Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte, to run for the presidency.

The President has said his daughter was not running to replace him by June 2022 despite opinion polls showing the mayor as the potential top contender for the presidency. 

He repeatedly said that his former longtime aide, Senator Christopher “Bong” Go, wanted to be president, a statement dismissed by the lawmaker as a joke.

“President Duterte is the head of this political dynasty, so we cannot accept anyone within that political dynasty to again run this country in the next term,” Carpio, head of the newly formed political coalition 1Sambayan, told ANC.

“This is the height of [a] political dynasty that the President will choose his daughter as his successor. We cannot allow this to happen.”

An enabling law is needed to implement the provision of the 1987 Constitution prohibiting political dynasties.

Carpio’s comments stemmed from Sara Duterte’s response to her exclusion from 1Sambayan’s potential candidates for president in the May 2022 election due to her affiliation with the administration.

She said 1Sambayan claimed to be a coalition of democratic forces but rejected those who disagreed with its leaders.

“They sound authoritarian to me,” the mayor said.

Carpio insisted that the coalition was against extrajudicial killings, violation of human rights, and political dynasties.

“All of these can be attributed to the President,” he said.

1Sambayan aims to come up with a single slate of national candidates — president, vice president, 12 senators — who will run against Duterte’s preferred successor and his other bets. -NB, GMA News