Thursday night’s press conference in Davao City was preview to what a Duterte presidency would look—and sound—like. A defiant Rodrigo Duterte faced the cameras again and said he would never apologize for his earlier comments on journalists and would never change the way he was for anybody and for any reason.
“Don’t f… with me,” he said to the media, some members of which have suggested boycotting him in protest of his statements.
Two evenings before, Duterte had angered many by saying that the reason journalists were being killed in this country was that they were corrupt. They had it coming.
The highlight of the evening, however, was not the unpresidential ranting against journalists but the emerging pattern of communication from Mr. Duterte and the media.
Experts would do better in observing the man over an extended period of time, but here’s what we have noticed so far: Mr. Duterte—or the persona he creates—defines what the news would be instead of answering the questions the people really want to ask.
His statements may be construed as offensive and even incendiary but they still leave enough room for him to change course or deny that he meant what he said. His defenders or he himself would just make it appear as though he was joking, was misunderstood or that the public was not paying any attention—their fault, not his.
Case in point: the wolf whistling.
In the earlier press conference, Duterte whistled in direct response to a female reporter’s question. Two days later, he said anybody could whistle and that whistling was not of a sexual nature. In fact, he asked: how can a woman be sure I am whistling at her when there are many other people in the room?
And then there are the journalists. On Tuesday he said those who were killed were the rotten ones, but on Thursday he made the effort to group journalists into three: the crusaders, those with vested interests because they are public relations consultants, and the extortionists.
Still, in succeeding sentences, he went back to generalizing. “All journalists ask. All.”
We are beginning to think that the president-elect is not some candid, loose-canon foul-mouthed people’s politician with a heart of gold. He is, in fact, more intelligent, sober calculating than he would have us think.