Escudero says Poe is her own person

Running mates Senators Grace Poe and Francis “Chiz” Escudero. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO/ARNOLD ALMACEN

Who is he to impose his will on his running mate?

Vice presidential candidate Sen. Francis “Chiz” Escudero brushed aside talk that presidential candidate Sen. Grace Poe, with whom he is running, would just be a figurehead in their independent team-up and that he would be the de facto president should they win in May.

While Poe garnered the biggest number votes in her first run for public office in 2013, she is a relative neophyte in politics.

“[Some say that] if Grace becomes president, that I would dictate upon her, like I dictated on her to run. I have proof that it’s not true,” he said.

His proof that Poe was her own person: President Aquino himself could not convince her to run as the Liberal Party’s vice presidential candidate under Mar Roxas.

“The most powerful man in the country, the President, literally and figuratively wined and dined her five times for one purpose—to try and convince her to run quite obviously as Mar’s running mate. Despite that, she said no,” said Escudero during a recent interview with Inquirer reporters and editors.

Opposite way

“That’s already the President. Maybe he has more to offer than me. But still, she went the opposite way. So it’s not only unfair to her, but unfair to me as well for that [figurehead] to be asked or even to be assumed,” he said.

He said Poe refused the President even if it was he who gave her first government job as chair of the Movie and Television Review and Classification Board in 2010.