PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte admitted Friday being an unrepentant flirt but defended himself against critics who accuse him of being prejudiced against women.
In front of ladies who attended “Digong’s Day for Women” at the Palace on Friday, Duterte discussed a photo of him and a woman whom he would not let go, despite her squirming.
“It may be objectionable to you, but I’m usually playful to women, and that’s who I am,” the President said.
“There was this attack against me about holding the hand of a woman [who] was struggling then…there was an item about us.”
In proving his point he was just being flirty, Duterte said he slipped a “brown worm” into the ring finger of the woman whom he identified as his “girlfriend.”
“Actually, whether she liked it or would not admit it, she was actually my girlfriend. If you touched the brown worm, it would squiggle, turn around and curl up,” Duterte said in Filipino.
“I just wanted to place the worm on her finger, and I said since I have no ring to give to you, this is the best stand-in,” he added, eliciting laughter from his audience.
Duterte stressed the woman he refused to identify was no longer with him and contended his loyalty to Honeylet Avanceña, his current partner.
Duterte insisted his fondness of cracking jokes during speeches, adding he was not “the chauvinist pig” or anti-feminist his critics picture him to be.
Duterte added he liked to joke around with female policewomen, as well as his nurses, but underlined his respect for women.
The President added he would not follow the advice given by Senator Panfilo Lacson for him to “start behaving like a statesman.”
In the same speech, Duterte regretted his mother, Soledad Roa, never saw him become the President of the Philippines.
“I finished high school (in) seven years. I attended different schools. But my sorrow really is that…I wish she saw me become President,” he said.
But he said his mother would have been in disbelief that he won the presidency.
“But, of course, I know she would not have believed it. Even I could not believe that I won,” he said.
Duterte’s mother was an activist who fought against the Marcos administration during the Martial Law years from 1972 to 1981.
She was one of the leaders in Davao City of the Yellow Friday Movement, which supported the candidacy of Corazon Aquino, who was catapulted to power following Marcos’ ouster in February 1986.
Also on Friday, high ranking officials of the Duterte administration asked women to tolerate and be more “forgiving” on the President’s catcalling and sexist remarks.
Interior Undersecretary Emily Padilla added Duterte could joke about extramarital affairs because he’s not married.
“When we say extramarital affair, the President is not married so he can make these kinds of remarks because, he isn’t married, right?”
Justice Assistant Secretary Aimee Neri, who worked with Duterte when he was Davao City mayor, added that Duterte might possibly be “misinterpreted,” adding he has a “helping hand” and a “heart that cares.”
“He does not tolerate any forms of abuses,” she said.
