Miriam Santiago calls Duterte the NPA candidate

Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago. INQUIRER PHOTO/NINO JESUS ORBETA

Unleashing her most bombastic remarks so far in her campaign for the presidency, Sen. Miriam Defensor Santiago on Thursday called Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte a candidate of the communist New People’s Army and warned that his leftist supporters may take up arms should he lose on May 9.

Santiago also alluded to Sen. Grace Poe as a candidate of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), linking Poe’s husband, Neil Llamanzares, a Philippine-born US citizen, to the CIA.  Llamanzares was reported to have once worked for the US Air Force.

Santiago, who appears rejuvenated by her latest round of cancer medication, did not accept administration candidate Mar Roxas’ claim that the race was now between him and Duterte, accusing pollsters of being paid to manipulate results.

She claimed her rivals had attempted to buy her out of the race, and that one candidate’s representative offered P350 million to “refund” her campaign expenses.

And for the first time in the campaign, Santiago lambasted President Aquino, calling his “daang matuwid” administration the “ultimate frustration of the Filipino people.”

“People like me who did not steal from the government stand no chance if we let my rivals go vote-buying and cheat. One is a candidate of the CIA, the other is a candidate of the NPA,” she told students at University of Santo Tomas in Manila on Thursday.

Facing reporters afterwards, Santiago said she was referring to Poe and Duterte, respectively.

“I feel very much there might be widescale cheating during the elections. The basis for that fear is that Duterte has already been announced if that is accurate, by  (Iglesia ni Cristo) as their official candidate but he is also accepted as the official candidate of the NPA,” she told reporters.

“So we have an NPA candidate. Will the CIA, which has a link to the husband of Grace Poe, allow the communists to win? So first of all there is a conflict between the NPA and the CIA,” she went on.

Sison’s friend

Santiago, who had previously held back her punches against Duterte whom she called a “good friend,” said the Davao mayor was a “favorite friend” of Communist Party of the Philippines founder Jose Maria Sison.

“It’s very dangerous because if people like (Sison) do not get what they want, they might resort to violence,” she said when asked if Duterte’s closeness to the exiled communist leader was a concern.

The worst scenario, she said, is “that they would go out in the streets with guns, firing at people who are not with them.”

Santiago, who has campaigned mostly in campuses where she remained very popular among students, said her own supporters may react strongly if they see signs of cheating in the elections.

“At this time I don’t know yet what counsel to give the young people, (whether) to go out in the streets and encounter people who are already threatening a revolution in case a certain candidate loses, or to just accept it,” she said, adding she stopped her supporters from staging street protests when she lost in the 1992 presidential elections.

Santiago brushed off Roxas’ claim that the race was down between him and survey front-runner Duterte.

“We cannot believe commercial surveys because first they will have a certain candidate leading (then) after they get a bigger sum of money, another candidate will be leading. So the (issue) for these commercial surveys is if you can pay them,” she said.

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