"Her father needs her to protect him."
The Filipino people should be taking at face value Sara Duterte-Carpio’s filing of a certificate of candidacy for re-election as mayor of Davao City. But they are not doing so, and there is a good reason for their attitude: They’ve seen an on-again-off-again Duterte candidacy before.
In September 2015, the then-mayor of Davao City, Rodrigo Duterte, declared that he would not run for President and would retire from politics at the end of his term. The PDP Laban party nominated Martin Diño as its candidate for president, but before the expiry of the deadline for candidate substitution, Rodrigo Duterte was substituted as the party’s standard-bearer.
Not all voters were surprised or caught off-guard by the substitution of Mr. Diño by Mr. Duterte. The Davao City mayor’s body language and prior flip-flopping public statements had provided indications of the coming mischief. Many voters suspected that Diño was merely keeping the presidential candidate’s seat warm for Rodrigo Duterte.
In light of the 2015 episode, many Filipinos are skeptical about Sara Duterte’s expression of preference for a re-electionist run for the mayorship of Davao City. They think that what the nation is interested in is Part II of the 2015 drama, with Mayor Sara deciding at the last minute – November 15 is the Comelec’s deadline for substitutions – to take her oath as a member of PDP Laban and head its national ticket. If one Duterte could play that trick, so can another Duterte, the skeptics are saying. They think Mayor Sara will abandon her candidacy for mayor and run for president instead.
I agree with the skeptics; the President's daughter will very probably run for president. She should. There are two reasons for her need to run for the presidency.
The first is that next year’s election is a now-or-never proposition for Sara Duterte-Carpio. After June 30, 2022, she will no longer be the Presidential daughter, with the power and the machinery and other resources of Malacanang at her disposal. In 2028, Mayor Sara will be just another bright, influential, and experienced chief executive of a Philippine city (assuming that she wants to stay on as Davao City’s mayor). For Sara Duterte-Carpio, the 2022 moment will never come again.
The second, and actually more important, reason for Mayor Sara’s need to run for the presidency next year is President Duterte’s vulnerability when he steps down from Malacanang. When he returns to the world of ordinary citizens, where Presidential immunity does not exist, Rodrigo Duterte will need all the protection he can get – especially high-level protection. During the last five and a half years, Mr. Duterte has done many questionable things and earned for himself numerous critics and enemies here and abroad, who will move to obtain justice the moment he is out of office. Certainly the thousands of families of victims of EJK are counting the days remaining until June 30, 2022.
A friendly victor in the 2022 vice-presidential race will not be able to do anything for ordinary-citizen Rodrigo Duterte. But a friendly newly-elected President, such as a daughter, can go a long way to protect him. Mr. Duterte cannot expect any of the other declared or potential presidential candidates, except Ferdinand Marcos Jr., to protect him after his presidency. The present Malacanang policy of non-cooperation with the International Criminal Court will come to an end the moment an unsympathetic victor assumes the presidency.
Sara Carpio alone can guarantee protection for Rodrigo Duterte after his presidency. That is why she will have to run for president. That is why she will run.