I COULD not believe my ears when I heard Pres. Benigno Aquino III say in a television interview that he is working on an alliance among presidential candidates so they could come together and work out something to defeat Philippine Presidential Election front-runner Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte. It seemed as though Aquino was lifting a page from the losing playbook of the US Senator Ted Cruz and Ohio Governor John Kasich, just so they could block business mogul and reality show star Donald Trump from becoming the Republican Party’s nominee for president.
Unfortunately for Aquino, this attempt was a losing strategy. Donald Trump has triumphed, and is the only remaining Republican candidate in the race. Whether the Cruz-Kasich tandem and the Republican Party establishment care to admit it, this ploy even helped the Trump campaign win. What was President Aquino thinking?
The Filipino electorate is clamoring for a strong leader who could get things done. But what Aquino just did just reinforced what the Duterte camp and his followers have been selling in this election — that Duterte fills that leadership void. Aquino, with all his good intentions for the Liberal Party and for the Filipino people to continue to thread his “Daang Matuwid,” just indirectly implied that his chosen heir to the presidency has no chance to win the election if he does not enter into this “alliance” with Sen. Grace Poe, VP Jejomar Binay or Sen. Miriam Defensor Santiago.
What made him think Sec. Mar Roxas’ opponents would drop out of the race to beat Duterte? All of them think they have a spot at winning and if they do not win, it would only be because they were cheated. We’ve heard this before during so many election cycles in the Philippines.
But was disappointing for me, personally, was Sec. Roxas’s seemingly instinctive obedience to Aquino. I was hoping he would have just respectfully distanced himself from Aquino’s plan, and stood his own ground to say he has confidence that the Filipino people would elect the best candidate for president, and that candidate is him.
First of all, Roxas has the experience, the character and the educational background to be president. Secondly, polls have shown his slow, but steady climb to the top. He used to be in 4th place, now he is in second place in many polls. If this trend continues and with all these allegations against Duterte, he could very well win those voters who have not really been on board the Duterte train.
In the remaining hours before the election, Roxas has to let his boldness shine, which voters once saw when he ran and came in first during the senatorial race. What happened to that man?
The next few days will be critical for Roxas. Let the real Roxas come out of Aquino’s shadow and be his own victorious man.
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Gel Santos Relos is the anchor of TFC’s “Balitang America.” Views and opinions expressed by the author in this column are are solely those of the author and not of Asian Journal and ABS-CBN-TFC. For comments, go to www.TheFil-AmPerspective.com, https://www.facebook.com/Gel.Santos.Relos
