Presidential Spokesman Harry Roque said he will only run for a national post in the 2022 elections if Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio will seek the presidency despite her father's wishes.
Roque made the statement after President Duterte reiterated that he did not want his daughter to run for president because of the many hardships she will get to experience.
In an interview with ANC Wednesday, June 9, Roque said he will only run in next year's polls if Carpio will run for president, saying she has the same qualities as the late senator Miriam Defensor-Santiago.
"I would run with the administration but I think I will only run if Mayor Inday Sara will run for the position of president," he said.
"I think, as a card-bearer of PRP (People's Reform Party), the party of Miriam Defensor-Santiago, it is Inday Sara who, I believe, has the same qualities as Miriam Defensor-Santiago to become president," he added.
Roque explained that he was a card-bearing member of Carpio's Hugpong ng Pagbabago (HNP) party and that he was affiliated with the PRP. He said the PRP recently renewed its certificate of alliance with HNP.
He added that he will make a different decision if HNP will not field any candidate.
"We have already a certificate of alliance, officially, between the People's Reform Party and Hugpong ng Pagbabago. Let's just say that we are bound by our alliance with Hugpong," he said.
"If Hugpong, later on, decides that they will not field any candidate, then that is the time we will make a decision," he added.
The Palace official, however, said he really wanted Carpio to run for president, adding he does not agree that she was not fit to become the country's leader like what President Duterte claimed because she was a woman.
"I'm one of those who are praying that Mayor Sara will, in fact, seek the presidency," Roque said.
"I don't agree with that and I think the President merely emphasized that given the hardships of being president, he does not want it, he does not wish it on his family, which is understandable coming from a good father," he added.
Roque said Carpio will eventually have to make a decision.
"I think Mayor Sara will eventually make up her mind and she will have to decide on her own regardless of what her father says," he said.
"She knows she has to work for it she knows that when she wins that the challenges are very grave. That's why it would have to be her personal decision," he added.
Recently, Carpio extinguished rumors about her running in tandem with President Duterte in next year's polls, saying she has already talked to her father about it.
"I went to see him (PRRD) last January 8. I told him I do not intend to run for President, he replied, 'Very good.' He also said he did not want me to run but nothing about gender was discussed," she said. (Argyll Cyrus B. Geducos)