Update
DON’T vote for a merciless murderer and butcher like Digong.
For the first time, Vice President Jejomar Binay made an epic declaration against his friend Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte during his campaign sortie in Barangay Bagong Silang in Caloocan City on Monday.
His previous campaign speeches usually attacked Mar Roxas as incompetent and Grace Poe as inexperienced.
Binay once praised Duterte as a good candidate for president having years of experience as local government chief executive in Davao City.
But on Monday, Binay’s admiration for Duterte turned into vilification. He minced no words in urging voters not to vote for Duterte, who he said is a “murderer” and a “butcher” for his alleged links to the Davao Death Squad.
Speaking from a makeshift stage in the country’s largest barangay, Binay said:
“Tapos na ang pagpapakita sa mga kandidato gamit ang mga artista. Ngayon, mag-muni muni muna kayo kung sino ang iboboto. Kailangan manaig ang karapatan ng tao na mabuhay.”
Binay pleaded to the crowd not to translate their amusement with Duterte to votes for the tough-talking mayor.
“Natitiyak ko ang inyong paghanga sa kanyang sinasabi na pinapatay ko yan! Puputulin ko ang ulo niyan! Huwag naman. Yung paghanga ninyo, sana huwag niyong ilipat sa pagboto. Kailangan ang iboboto niyo, maipagmamalaki ninyo na maging pangulo. Responsibilidad ng bawat isang Pilipino na hindi dapat maging pangulo itong si Duterte,” Binay said, eliciting cheers from the crowd.
Binay said Duterte’s alleged death squad has committed extra-judicial killings of suspected criminals and drug pushers who came from the ranks of the poor.
“Kung may pambansang kamao na si Manny Pacquiao, mayroon naman tayong pambansang berdugo na pumapatay ng mahihirap. Hindi po tama yan,” Binay said.
“Si Duterte, pinalabas na ang mananalo dahil sa maraming pinalalabas na humahanga sa kanya. Hindi niyo dapat ikahanga yan, pumapatay ng tao yan, walang awang pumapatay ng tao po yan,” Binay added.
Binay said voters may regret choosing Duterte for president because of the latter’s harsh anti-crime policy that may victimize innocent people.
“Bakit kayo magsisisi!? Anak ng pucha, bakit ito pa binoto ko?! Kapag napatay na ang anak ko, ang mahal ko sa buhay,” Binay said.
While Duterte claims his answer to criminality is extra-judicial killings, Binay said his way to maintain law and order is aimed at improving the lives of the poor to stop them from becoming criminals.
“Kung sagot niya sa kriminalidad ay papatayin ko, ako iba. Kahirapan. Wala kang problema dahil naiangat ko ang buhay sa Makati. Hindi tama na ang sagot sa kriminalidad ay pagpatay,” Binay said.
Binay on Monday took his sortie to Barangay Bagong Silang, the country’s largest barangay with over 245, 000 residents.
The Vice President launched his attacks against Duterte after the latter led the latest Social Weather Stations survey (first published in BusinessWorld) conducted March 30 to April 2 with 27 percent of 1,500 respondents choosing Duterte as the next president.
Meanwhile, previous survey frontrunner Senator Grace Poe found herself in a statistical tie with Binay at 23 percent and 20 percent, respectively. The survey has a margin of error of plus minus three percentage points.
Administration standard-bearer Mar Roxas garnered 18 percent, while Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago placed last at three percent.
READ: Duterte is new frontrunner in SWS poll
In an interview after his campaign sortie in Barangay Bagong Silang, Binay said he is not afraid of Duterte if ever the mayor would put behind bars Binay’s family for alleged corruption.
“Siguro magiging mayabang lang ako, hindi ako natatakot kay Duterte… Ba’t ako matatakot? Totoo naman ang sinasabi ko,” Binay said.
While he was hailed for his anti-crime crusade, Duterte had been linked to the Davao Death Squad, an alleged gang of assassins purportedly responsible for the deaths of 1,000 suspected criminals in the city since he became mayor in 1988.
“They say I am the death squad? True, that is true,” Duterte once said in a television interview admitting his ties to the alleged group.
READ: Duterte confirms ‘ties’ with Davao Death Squad
The New York-based Human Rights Watch has expressed concern for Duterte’s backing of extra-judicial killings amid a rise in summary executions of suspected criminals in Davao City.
The Human Rights Watch in a commentary even called Duterte the “Philippines’ Death Squad Mayor.”
“The Philippine government should take a zero-tolerance approach to any public official who publicly endorses extrajudicial killings as an acceptable means of crime control,” Phelim Kine, HRW deputy Asia director, said in a statement last year.
READ: Duterte to rights group: You are all hypocrites
When rights group Amnesty International in December 2015 issued a statement condemning Duterte’s record of human rights violations, Duterte said the group understated his record and bragged that he had killed 1,700 people, not 700 people.
READ: Amnesty Int’l raises red flags on Duterte
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