Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte yesterday announced she would run for president of the Southeast Asian nation of 116 million in 2028.
Duterte, who is embroiled in a bitter feud with Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr, was impeached last year only to see the country’s Supreme Court throw the case out over procedural issues.
Her announcement comes just days before her father, former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte, begins a pretrial hearing at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in the Netherlands over crimes against humanity allegedly committed as part of a brutal crackdown on drugs.
Photo: AP
“I offer my life, my strength and my future in the service of our nation,” the 47-year-old vice president told a news conference where she assailed Marcos’ record. “I am Sara Duterte. I will run for president of the Philippines.”
Sara Duterte accused Marcos of corruption in her brief speech, saying he had failed to live up to his word during the short-lived alliance that saw them storm to a landslide victory in the 2022 presidential election.
“In the first few months of our terms, I already saw Bongbong Marcos Jr’s lack of sincerity regarding the promises made during the campaign, as well as his sworn duty to the nation,” she said, using Marcos’s nickname.
Ateneo Policy Center senior researcher Michael Henry Yusingco said the campaign announcement was a “big risk,” but that Sara Duterte’s solid base of support in the family stronghold Mindanao gave her a real advantage.
“Conventional thinking would say she has the best chance of winning. Survey numbers are in her favor,” he said, adding that her father’s physical absence might discourage supporters.
Cleve Arguelles, president of Manila-based WR Numero Research, said that Sara Duterte’s public declaration could be more about keeping allies in line at a time of political uncertainty.
“By projecting an inevitable 2028 run, she raises the perceived cost of defection — reminding politicians in Congress that her faction could still return to power,” he said.
The announcement was aimed at drawing “a clear line among those who are with her or against her, given the ICC and the impeachment” cases, agreed Jean Franco, political science professor at the University of the Philippines.
Philippine presidents are limited to a single six-year term, which eliminates Marcos from the field.
The Marcos administration was now likely to become more openly hostile, Yusingco said.
“Behind the scenes, they’ll probably push for her impeachment,” he said.
Sara Duterte has seen the impeachment bid against her revived in the past few weeks, with members of the Philippine clergy filing a case against her on Monday last week, one of three logged within days.
Under the Philippine constitution, an impeachment triggers a Senate trial. A guilty verdict would result in Sara Duterte being barred from politics and sidelined from the presidential race.
Meanwhile, a pair of impeachment complaints against Marcos were tossed out by the Philippine House of Representatives justice committee, which said they lacked the necessary substance.
Marcos still faces his own headwinds, with the archipelago nation roiling over a scandal involving bogus flood-control projects believed to have cost taxpayers billions of dollars.
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