Duterte eyes Romualdez as admin’s VP bet in 2022

MANILA, Philippines — A year and a half until the next elections, President Duterte has expressed his desire to recruit House Majority Leader Martin Romualdez as vice presidential candidate of his administration in the 2022 general elections.

ACT-CIS Rep. Eric Go Yap, chair of the House appropriations committee, confirmed that Duterte made the remark on Dec. 28 when the President signed the 2021 budget or the General Appropriations Law.

“I heard it right from the President’s mouth,” Yap said, adding he was with Senate President Vicente Sotto III, Senate Majority Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri, Sen. Bong Go, Deputy Speaker Abraham Tolentino and House Minority Leader Joseph Stephen Paduano.

Romualdez, a lawyer-banker, represents the first district of Leyte. He is also president of the Philippine Constitution Association and of the once powerful Lakas-CMD, which now has about 32 members in the House.

Romualdez is a nephew of former first lady Imelda Marcos, who hails from Leyte, and first cousin of Sen. Imee Marcos.

Sources say Duterte was impressed with Romualdez, who has been a consensus-builder, and who remained neutral in the speakership fight between Taguig Rep. Alan Peter Cayetano and Speaker Lord Allan Velasco.

This was not the first time the President floated the idea of picking Romualdez as the administration party’s standard-bearer for vice president, as he credited the lawmaker’s performance in steering the government’s legislative agenda.

Unlike Cayetano and Velasco, Duterte didn’t want Romualdez to have a term-sharing agreement with a fellow congressman, that is why he will serve as House majority leader throughout the 18th Congress from July 2019 to June 2022.