Interior Secretary Manuel “Mar” Roxas II gives his acceptance speech shortly after Philippine President Benigno Aquino III endorsed him as the administration’s standard bearer for the May 2016 presidential elections, Friday, July 31, 2015 at the historic Club Filipino in suburban San Juan, east of Manila, Philippines. The 58-year-old former congressman and senator said he was honored to be endorsed by Aquino of the dominant Liberal Party. AP PHOTO
Liberal Party (LP) standard-bearer and Interior Secretary Manuel “Mar” Roxas II has to reinvent his image to boost his chances of winning in the 2016 presidential elections, a political analyst said on Friday.
Jan Robert Go, a political science professor at the University of the Philippines, said Roxas should “create his own identity” and veer away from the shadows of President Benigno Aquino III, who endorsed him on Friday as the administration’s presidential bet next year.
“Mar Roxas has to create his own identity: ‘Sino ba ako? Hindi ako lang basta inendorso ni PNoy. I’m not just the one who was endorsed by the president. I’m not just the president’s man. In fact, I’m a different person,’” Go said in an interview with ABS-CBN News Channel.
Go said Roxas should think of a more unique and creative packaging than fashioning himself as someone who would continue the Aquino administration’s “Daang Matuwid” (straight path) reformist strategy.
“Mar Roxas has to face that challenge. You see he’s always saying, this is a continuation of the straight path that this current administration is holding on to. But if that would be the case, so what [would be] the difference [in his presidency]?” Go added.
To meet the voting public’s expectations, Go said Roxas should rise to the challenge of providing something “new and more.”
“Maybe people are expecting something more, and Mar Roxas should provide something even more than Daang Matuwid. Especially for the past five years, what have we seen with this Daang Matuwid? If this will be just a continuation, so what’s going to happen to the Philippines?” Go said.
“New and more—and I think it’s a challenge for the Roxas camp and the Liberal Party to package Mar Roxas in that sense,” he added.
On Friday, Aquino formally endorsed Roxas as his chosen successor during an LP event dubbed as “Gathering of Friends” at the historic Club Filipino in San Juan, where he declared his own presidential bid in 2009.
“There may be others who are thinking that others can probably carry on what we have started, that there are others who can probably go after the corrupt, that there are others who will probably continue improving the economy and giving service to public, that there are others who will probably continue to tread the straight path. But for me, why should we go for candidates who are unsure when we have someone who is a sure bet?” Aquino said.
READ: Aquino officially endorses Mar Roxas as LP standard-bearer | ‘I am Mar Roxas, I accept the challenge of my bosses | Aquino names Mar of the hour
Roxas “sacrificed” his 2010 presidential ambition for Aquino, whose popularity surged following the death of his mother, the late democracy icon and former president Corazon Aquino.
Coming from a wealthy political clan in the Visayas, the Interior secretary is the grandson of the Philippines’ first post-World War II president Manuel Roxas, son of the late senator Gerry Roxas, and brother of late Capiz Rep. Gerardo “Dinggoy” Roxas Jr.
Roxas has been lagging behind Vice President Jejomar Binay and Sen. Grace Poe in recent presidential surveys. IDL