“Wala akong label sa relationship namin ngayon (I don’t have a label for our relationship right now).”
This is what Vice President Sara Duterte told reporters on Saturday, August 17, when asked about her current relationship with President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
“Hindi na kami nagkikita, hindi na rin kami nagkakausap (We don’t see each other anymore, and we don’t talk anymore either),” she said.
Duterte resigned from the Marcos Cabinet on June 19, signaling a complete collapse of the Uniteam alliance that brought about a Marcos-Duterte win in 2022.
With that split, the Vice President appears to be positioning herself as the political opposition, which doesn’t sit well with the Liberal Party. They said that her track record shows otherwise.
In her recent tirade, Sara Duterte criticized the Marcos government, including the House of Representatives, for their supposed inaction on pressing issues, as if she herself wasn’t part of the system. (READ: Sara Duterte takes a swipe at Marcos gov’t, but won’t it backfire?)
Sara Duterte knows too well that parting ways and her criticism could backfire — she said she expects an impeachment case to be filed against her.
“That is expected. And lagi namang pinapag-usapan among members of the House of Representatives ang impeachment, at naririnig naman namin lagi ‘yun, base sa mga sinasabi ng mga kaibigan doon sa loob,” she said.
(That is expected. It’s always discussed among members of the House of Representatives. We always hear about it from our friends inside.)
“Expected na natin ‘yan dahil mainit nga ang politika ngayon dito sa ating bayan (We expected that because politics is indeed heated here in our country right now),” she added.
The alleged ouster plot against the Vice President was floated by former presidential spokesperson Harry Roque. Key House lawmakers quickly denied Roque’s allegation, but Ako Bicol party-list Representative Jil Bongalon said that “it would not be a surprise if somebody would file an impeachment case against the Vice President.”
Duterte is no stranger to impeachment rumors. In November 2023, a similar rumor was floated after she drew flak over use of hefty confidential funds. Marcos at that time said he didn’t want the Vice President to get impeached.
Tables have turned. Does the President still have the same stand?
The impeachment rumor came as House lawmakers formed a quad committee that is probing into the links among illegal Philippine offshore gaming operators, Chinese syndicates, the illegal drug trade, and extrajudicial killings in the country.
During the hearing on August 16, former Bureau of Customs intelligence officer Jimmy Guban said that he had been told that a multi-billion-peso shabu shipment seized in 2018 belonged to Sara’s brother Davao City Representative Paolo Duterte, her husband Mans Carpio, and former presidential economic adviser Michael Yang.
The Vice President dismissed this allegation by Guban as “political harassment.”
“Nakikita ‘nyo naman, lumabas siya noong umalis ako sa DepEd (Department of Education), lumabas siya nung nagsasalita na ako kung ano’ng dapat pinagawa natin para sa ating bayan,” Duterte said.
(As you can see, he came out when I left the Department of Education, and he also surfaced when I started speaking about what we should be doing for our country.)
After breaking away from the Marcos administration, the Vice President should brace herself for political attacks. In Philippine politics, vice presidents who break ranks with the president do not fare so well among voters. Evidently, a June 23 to July 1 survey from the Social Weather Stations (SWS) showed that Sara Duterte’s satisfaction rating plunged to its lowest, following her June 19 exit from the Marcos Cabinet.
She suffered a 19-point drop in her net satisfaction rating, from 63% in March to 44% in June.
Historically, vice presidents who pick fights with their incumbent presidents end up on the losing end. Case in point, the experiences of then-vice presidents Jejomar Binay and Leni Robredo. They were initially part of the Cabinet but later resigned because of divergent views. Binay had been leading the surveys for the presidency that time but he became the subject of attacks. Meanwhile, Robredo became the casualty of online propaganda discrediting her work as vice president.
Will Sara Duterte suffer the same fate as her predecessors? Will she be able to give her ratings a much-needed boost before it’s too late? While 2028 is still four years away, the clock is ticking.
– Rappler.com
