Vice President Leni Robredo. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO/ MARIANNE BERMUDEZ
Allies of President Duterte and those of losing presidential bet Jejomar Binay have accused Vice President Leni Robredo of “playing good girl” to international donors and undermining the government’s push for an independent foreign policy.
“It should be drawn that Robredo does not share the President’s vision for an independent country, but is hospitable to foreign countries dictating us, comparable to her party-mate, former president [Benigno Aquino III],” said Anakpawis Rep. Ariel Casilao.
Casilao, a member of the Makabayan bloc in Congress, accused the vice president of “playing good girl” for saying at a recent antipoverty summit that ending poverty was a “larger war that needs attention” than government’s deadly antidrugs campaign.
The remark also drew censure from Binay’s spokesperson Joey Salgado, who said poverty worsened because of the failure of the previous administration to adequately address the problem.
“With all due respect to Vice President Robredo, her party, the Liberal Party (LP), failed to address poverty in the six years it was in power. This is why poverty remains a serious problem today,” Salgado said in a statement.
‘Insensitive’
Salgado also assailed LP’s governance style as “insensitive” to the plight of the poor.
Casilao, on the other hand, criticized the Vice President for defending foreign aid and saying it was not a “beggar-donor relationship.”
READ: PH int’l ties not a ‘beggar-donor’ relationship—Robredo
This was in stark comparison to Mr. Duterte’s stand, which was to wean Filipinos from what he has termed a “beggar mentality.”
He also accused Robredo of usurping the mandate of the National Anti-Poverty Commission (NAPC) chaired by former Gabriela Rep. Liza Maza, also of Makabayan.
On Monday, NAPC’s Twitter and Facebook accounts posted messages that insulted Robredo and her supporter, actress Agot Isidro, who grabbed headlines for her social media post criticizing Mr. Duterte and calling him a “psychopath.”
NAPC’s post said in Filipino: “Robredo and Isidro have one thing in common—they are both afraid to starve!”
It has since been deleted and NAPC has apologized for the “distasteful statements.”
Robredo, an LP member, was the running mate of losing Liberal Party presidential candidate Mar Roxas.