Bongbong announces solo quest for Veep

Sen. Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO / NIÑO JESUS ORBETA

SEN. FERDINAND “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. is going solo in his quest for the vice presidency.

He announced last night that he decided not to have a running mate because he was against the politics of personality, which he claimed was one of the main reasons the Philippines was a soft state where the rich became richer, the poor became poorer, and graft and corruption were endemic.

The son and namesake of the dictator Ferdinand Marcos said last night that he would run for Vice President in the May 2016 elections without teaming up with a presidential candidate.

“All these talks of teaming up with certain presidential candidates have been mere speculations,” Marcos, 58, said in a statement.

He was apparently referring to Vice President Jejomar Binay, an announced presidential candidate and Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte, who has yet to decide whether he will seek the country’s highest post.

Marcos, elected senator in 2010, said he went to Davao City last week to consult Duterte about his plans.

“He (Duterte) was gracious enough to promise me his support should I decide to run for Vice President. I, too, will support Mayor Duterte if and when he runs for President,” Marcos said.

Explaining his talks with Binay, Marcos said that he was invited to be his running mate and that there were initial talks between their supporters.

“But any team-up with the Vice President must be rooted in a shared vision for our country, a common platform of government as well as political perspectives,” he said.

“Unfortunately, it would be difficult for me to tame our political differences.”

Binay was a human rights lawyer during martial law.

Marcos said that elected officials had an obligation to “help change the course of history by banishing the politics of personality, which is to me one of the primary causes why our country today has become a soft state where the rich become richer, the poor become poorer, graft and corruption are endemic, the drug menace pervades, injustice is the norm and government incompetence is accepted as the new normal.”

Because of this, Marcos said he was casting his “political fortune in the hands of the Filipino people.”

“I humbly ask them to judge whether or not I am worthy of their trust to be Vice President on the strength of my performance as a public servant in the last 26 years: first as former vice governor and governor of Ilocos Norte, then as representative of the second district of Ilocos Norte and finally, as a senator of the country,” he said.

The entry of Marcos in the vice presidential race brought to six the number of vice presidential candidates—Camarines Sur Rep. Leni Robredo, Senators Alan Peter Cayetano, Gregorio Honasan II, Antonio Trillanes IV and Francis Escudero.

Robredo is the running mate of Liberal Party standard-bearer Mar Roxas, while Escudero is the running mate of Sen. Grace Poe. Honasan is expected to be the running mate of Vice President Jejomar Binay, presidential candidate of the United Nationalist Alliance.

Marcos, Cayetano and Trillanes are all members of the Nacionalista Party of former Senate President Manny Villar, who lost in the presidential election in 2010. Christine O. Avendaño