PRESIDENTIAL candidate and Vice President Jejomar Binay said Thursday he agreed with three Supreme Court justices that Senator Grace Poe, the frontrunner in opinion polls for the 2016 elections, is not a natural-born citizen and should therefore be disqualified from running for president.
In a radio interview, Binay described Poe as “patriotic,” but said her qualifications for running for the highest elective post in the land was a question of law, not emotion.
At the Senate Electoral Tribunal, Supreme Court Justices Arturo Brion, Antonio Carpio and Teresita de Castro voted in favor to the disqualification case filed against Poe at the Senate Electoral Tribunal but were outvoted by five senators 5-4. Binay’s daughter, Senator Nancy Binay, voted with the minority.
“No law automatically grants citizenship to foundlings born in the Philippines and even if there were, such a law would only result in the foundling being a naturalized Filipino citizen, not a natural-born Filipino citizen,” Carpio earlier said.
“It’s really a question of law. There is no room for emotions. There is no shedding of tears like on television,” Binay said.
“I feel sad but we have to follow the law on citizenship,” Binay said, referring to the constitutional requirement that senators and the president must be natural-born Filipino citizens.
Binay said being a foundling does not strip Poe of her Filipino citizenship, just her status as a natural-born one.
“We are not denying her of being a Filipino. She is a Filipino but not a natural born. That makes [her] disqualified to run for the presidency,” he said. “Being a foundling is not an issue.”
Poe was found abandoned at the Jaro Cathedral in Iloilo City and was adopted by celebrity couple Fernando Poe Jr. and Susan Roces.
Poe on Wednesday night defended herself from attacks from rival candidates who questioned her status as a natural-born citizen, saying it would be convenient for Binay if she were disqualified.
Poe, who was invited in to a presidential candidate’s forum organized by the Harvard Club of the Philippines, Kellog School of Management, and the Wharton and University of Pennsylvania Alumni Association, countered attacks from Binay, but said she would respect the rule of law if she were disqualified.
“I will continue to fight the disqualification cases filed against us. It is the right of every Filipino. However, a child abandoned by her parents should not be abandoned by the government,” she added.
In attacking Poe, Binay joined the ranks of Liberal Party standard bearer Manuel Roxas II and Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte, who have hammered her on her status.
Poe also dispelled notions that she left the Philippines and chose to be an American citizen.
“A lot of you here were educated abroad,” Poe spoke to the crowd of mostly Filipino alumni of Ivy League schools. “You were given that opportunity and so was I. And living in a different country, in a different continent gives you sometimes a better perspective or a clearer perspective of how things should be and what we deserve to have in this country. I think that our entitlements were all gone when we left for abroad because we realized that we are just one of the many. But while living abroad we realized, also, how much we love this country and how much we want to give back,” she said.
“All of us are Filipinos who love our country so much and we want to serve. We should not be held back for that,” she added.