Retired military general Antonio Parlade, known for being the mouthpiece of the government’s anti-insurgency task force, on Monday filed his candidacy for president next year as a substitute of Katipunan ng Demokratikong Pilipino (KDP) party.
“Let me clarify: I am not a politician, I am a soldier… With this circus that’s happening now, I don't see any good hope for the country,” Parlade told reporters at the Commission on Elections on the last day of accepting authorized changes among candidates of political parties for the 2022 polls.
Also on the last day for filing for substitution and withdrawal, former national police chief Gen. Guillermo Eleazar filed his candidacy for senator, substituting for senatorial aspirant Paolo Capino.
Parlade said he would like to seek the country’s No. 1 job, following the recent cut on the 2022 budget of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict’s (NTF-ELCAC).
“I cannot align with SBG (Sen. Bong Go), I’m sorry. But he is with the country’s problems… I just don’t like the way he does things, including controlling the decisions of the President,” Parlade said.
Parlade, who retired as head of the military’s Southern Luzon Command in July, was recently appointed as deputy director-general of the National Security Council.
The Comelec tentative list of aspirants for the 2022 polls suggests that KDP is not a recognized party. Parlade said the issue was being resolved by the poll body’s en banc.
Based on the Comelec’s list of individuals who filed their COCs on Oct. 1-8, the KDP’s presidential bet is Antonio Valdes. On Saturday, he withdrew his candidacy.
Asked for his comment about Parlade’s bid, labor leader Leody De Guzman said the retired military general could use his position to continue advocating for violence.
Even though he was appointed by President Rodrigo Duterte as the sixth PNP chief under his administration, Eleazar will run under Partido Reforma, led by the tandem of Senators Panfilo Lacson and Vicente Sotto III. Lacson is also a former PNP chief.
In a Facebook post on Sunday, November 14, Eleazar formally announced his bid for the Senate.
The former PNP chief, on Sunday, also took his oath as a member of Lacson’s party.
Eleazar is the most recent PNP chief to gun for a Senate seat, after Senator Ronald dela Rosa’s successful run in 2019. Dela Rosa was Duterte’s first PNP chief who also oversaw the implementation of the bloody drug war.
Presidential spokesman Harry Roque, meanwhile, said the jumble of substitutions and withdrawals of certificates of candidacy among administration candidates and allies just before the deadline was not tantamount to mocking or deceiving the people, presidential spokesperson Harry Roque declared Monday.
Pressed if such a strategy was legally right but morally wrong, Roque replied by saying he did not respond to questions of morality.
Roque also resigned from his post, as he filed his certificate of candidacy for senator on Monday, the last day for substitution of candidates.
Presidential appointees are immediately deemed resigned after they file their candidacy.
Earlier that week, Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio dropped her reelection bid, quit her regional party Hugpong ng Pagbabago, and joined Lakas-CMD.
Also on Saturday, Dela Rosa, also of the Duterte-chaired PDP-Laban, withdrew his COC for president as well.
Meanwhile, presidential aspirant Lacson said the Philippines’ election code must be amended to remove voluntary substitutions, adding he and his running mate Senate President Vicente Sotto III “agreed we should take a serious look in amending the election code.”
“We need to legislate because as of now, there’s nothing in the law that prohibits Comelec from changing the resolution, so naging ganyan ang situation,” he told ANC’s Headstart.
“Substitution must only be allowed in case of death or incapacity, nothing more because when it becomes voluntary that’s when abuse occurs,” he said.
Roque confirmed his intention to seek a senate seat in the 2022 national elections in his Monday’s press briefing, saying “for the last time, this is your spokesman Harry Roque saying, I love you, Philippines!”
“I am happy to have accomplished this mission. I will leave this job better than how I came upon it,” he said.
Roque said he had told President Rodrigo Duterte and Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio of his decision to run for senator in the 2022 elections
Meanwhile, Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III dropped his plan to run for the Senate in the 2022 national elections but instead vowed to intensify the government’s assistance to workers.
In a statement, Bello said he would rather help the needy workers displaced by the pandemic than to participate in next year’s elections and help the employment rate recover from the crises brought by COVID-19.
“I find it urgent to address the needs of our displaced workers so I’m no longer participating in the polls,” he said.
Bello said it’s important that the amelioration program of the government reaches all workers including the overseas Filipino workers (OFWs).
“That is also one of my priorities in keeping my job in DOLE. We need to bring back the jobs our workers lost because of the global outbreak,” he said.
After presiding over the ILO conference last month in Switzerland, Bello said he planned to further push for the UN body’s democratization in a conference set on November 25 this year.
“I will definitely continue advocating for a more democratic ILO so that all nations including the small ones can voice out their respective advocacies,” Bello said.
