Panelo: Duterte will not resign

FILE: Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo and President Rodrigo Duterte (Photo: RODRIGUEZ/PPD)

When President Rodrigo Duterte announced that he will consider stepping down, Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo said the Chief Executive will not actually do it.

“His statement was more of an expression of exasperation, a cry of sheer disgust on what is happening vis-a-vis the drive against corruption. He’s so pissed off,” Panelo told ANC on Friday, August 17.

“But knowing him, he’s not a quitter,” he added.

Panelo stressed that Duterte’s only intention of making such pronouncement was “to tell people that ‘I’m disgusted, I’m exasperated, I want to resign’” but the Palace official believes that the President will not do so.

In a speech on Tuesday, August 14, Duterte said he will only resign from his post if someone like Senator Francis “Chiz” Escudero or former Senator Ferdinand “Bongbong Marcos” Jr. will be the next president.

Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque Jr. on Thursday said the Chief Executive may keep true to his word of resigning if Marcos will win his electoral protest against Vice President (VP) Maria Leonor “Leni” Robredo.

Asked why the President floated the name of Marcos when he is not even Duterte’s Constitutional successor, the Chief Legal Counsel said it was just a ‘comparison’ between the sitting Vice President and the losing vice presidential bet.

“As far as the President is concerned, the way the VP responds to particular question, the way she discusses issues, he feels that this person is not capable of running this country,” Panelo said.

Back in July, Duterte has been saying that Robredo cannot govern a country like the Philippines because she is ‘incompetent.’

But Romulo Macalintal, Robredo’s lead counsel, asserted that the Vice President is ‘qualified’ to be the Philippine leader as she met the same qualifications Duterte has as required by the Constitution.

Robredo, he said, deserves to prove to everyone that she is capable to lead “in her own style and approach on current problems of the country.”

“As a lawyer, you know she is entitled to due process or right to be heard before she could be accused of not being qualified to perform the functions of the presidency [to] which under the Constitution she is the rightful successor,” he continued.