Malacañang: Duterte still recognizes Cusi as PDP-Laban vice chair

Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines — President Rodrigo Duterte still recognizes Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi as vice chair of the ruling Partido Demokratiko Pilipino-Lakas ng Bayan (PDP-Laban), according to Malacañang.

Tensions have intensified between the faction led by Duterte and Cusi and the one under PDP-Laban president Sen. Manny Pacquiao, who criticized the President’s position on the West Philippine Sea and alleged that corruption worsened under his administration.

Pacquiao is in the United States preparing for an Aug. 21 bout. Earlier, he expelled Cusi and two other party officials for openly pushing for the presidential bid of the President’s daughter, Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio, who is not a member of the party.

Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said on Monday that the PDP-Laban meeting on Saturday, as called by Cusi, is on Duterte’s calendar.

“All I can say is he recognizes the leadership of Secretary Cusi and that is why he will attend the party special meeting on July 17,” Roque said at a press briefing.

Roque reiterated the President’s earlier statement that the party dispute would be resolved “legally.”

“So let us wait for the next chapter,” he said.

President’s role

A senior official of the party claimed that Duterte himself has “orchestrated” the infighting.

“I have this feeling that this problem in the PDP-Laban was orchestrated not only by Cusi. I know that the President knew [about it] all along,” lawyer and party veteran Lutgardo Barbo, PDP-Laban vice president for the Visayas, said in an online forum on Monday organized by the Movement Against Tyranny.

“Maybe he thought he could resolve it because he being the President can always say, ‘Enough is enough. You should listen to me. I’m the President. I’m the chair of PDP-Laban,’” he said.

Barbo said Duterte’s position in the party founded by the late anti-Marcos leaders Aquilino “Nene” Pimentel Jr. and Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr. did not give him a “license to dictate on us.”

“PDP-Laban is such an alternative political party that we are allowed to question some wrong and call out each other. We are, in fact, required to do that,” he said.

Barbo, a former Eastern Samar governor who also served as Senate secretary twice, voiced his support for those opposing the plan to field Duterte as the party’s candidate for vice president in 2022.

‘Too much’

Barbo insisted that since the Constitution clearly prohibits the president from serving another six-year term through reelection, Mr. Duterte should also be disqualified from seeking a public post that would allow him to return to power.

“It would violate the legal maxim that ‘what is not allowed directly is not allowed indirectly,’” Barbo said.

Besides, he pointed out, Duterte being the country’s most powerful man for six years was already “too much.”

Barbo said he was “hoping and praying” that party members would resist any resolution urging Duterte to seek the vice presidency.

Lawyer Howard Calleja of the 1Sambayan Coalition acknowledged that legally contesting Duterte’s possible bid for vice president was still premature at this point since he had yet to file a certificate of candidacy.