Visayas groups cling to Digong

A BOY plays hide-and-seek behind a poster featuring Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte during a press conference of his supporters for a rally in Cebu City on Nov. 22. TONEE DESPOJO/CEBU DAILY NEWS

CEBU CITY—Davao Mayor Rodrigo  “Digong” Duterte may have repeatedly declared he’s not interested in the presidency in 2016 but his supporters in the Visayas are not giving up.

The national executive coordinating council committee of Duterte’s political party,

PDP-Laban, will hold a rally at the University of the Philippines Cebu in Barangay Lahug here on Sunday to convince Duterte to run for President.

The group is expecting Duterte to attend and speak at the rally which is scheduled from 1 p.m. to 10 p.m.

Performers, like Luke Mijares and Jimmy Bondoc, would perform at the rally while Thor Dulay, another performer, would sing “Takbo,” a song composed for Duterte.

The nine-hour rally would also feature a job fair and T-shirt printing.

Lawyer Noel Filonco, PDP-Laban director for Central Visayas, said there is still time to convince the mayor to change his mind and run for President.

The Commission on Elections has set the deadline for substitution of candidates at 5 p.m. on Dec. 10.

Martin Dino, PDP-Laban chair, earlier withdrew his certificate of candidacy for President and his party nominated Duterte to be Dino’s substitute.

Filonco said they were expecting more than 30,000 supporters to converge at the UP Cebu grounds on Sunday to show their support to the Davao mayor.

Retired Maj. Noel Guerrero, of the group Civilian Volunteer Organization, said many organizations from different sectors are ready to support Duterte’s presidential bid.

He said even overseas Filipino workers in the Middle East, Hong Kong, Australia, Japan and Europe are raising funds for the mayor.

Duterte has gone on sorties around the country for his campaign to shift to a federal form of government.

The sorties were interpreted as the mayor’s way of gauging public sentiment on his possible run for President.

In several popularity surveys, Duterte has consistently received a 15 percent rating even after he declared he is not interested to run for President.