HE ONCE scavenged through garbage heaps to help feed his family in one of Manila's most distressed slums. But today, Isko Moreno has launched himself on a bid to rule the Philippines.
Moreno, the
Manila City mayor and former actor, announced Wednesday he's running to succeed
President Rodrigo Duterte, whose term ends in June 2022.
Moreno's entry
into the race has sparked attention because of his relative meteoric rise and
his potential to upset a growing field of contenders who are vying for the
highest office.
In 2019, Moreno
defeated the incumbent – a former Philippine president – to become mayor of
Manila City, population 1.8 million. Manila City is the country's capital and
one of the sixteen different municipalities that make up greater Manila.
The 46-year-old is now the third
high-profile aspirant to enter the race after Philippine boxing legend Manny
Pacquiao and Panfilo Lacson, a former national police chief. The polling group
Pulse Asia released a public opinion survey in July showing Moreno a strong contender,
the second choice to become the country's next leader behind Duterte's
daughter, Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio, who has said she won't run but
observers expect that could change.
His district as mayor is both posh and impoverished. It encompasses Old Manila with its Cathedral Spanish-era Intramuros fort, and the president's MalacaƱang Palace. The district is also home to Tondo, the hard-scrabble neighborhood where he grew up an only child hauling trash, and scrounging for food that his mother is said to have "repurposed" into family dinners. His father was a stevedore on the nearby docks.
The next president faces myriad challenges
Duterte's
successor stands to inherit weighty problems: the pandemic, a battered economy,
long-entrenched poverty and decades-long insurgencies waged by communists and
Muslim rebel groups.
In announcing his presidential bid,
Moreno said were he to win the May 9, 2022 election, he would combat COVID-19,
which has killed 37,000 in the Philippines, battle on
behalf of the poor, and promote democracy.
He chose as his
running Willie Ong, who made an unsuccessful bid for the Senate in 2019. A
cardiologist, Ong has a huge social media base, and provides medical advice to
Filipinos on a Facebook account that has more than 16 million followers.
"It's
politically unorthodox, but it makes sense," Moreno said of his choice for
running mate.
If elected,
Moreno says he'll focus on resuscitating the economy while his vice president
would focus on the pandemic.
Moreno has grown more critical of Duterte
Moreno had been a
supporter of President Duterte, and has been criticized for his silence on
Duterte's bloody war on drugs in which police operations have killed thousands,
mostly poor Filipinos, many of them in the slums of Manila.
But in the last
year, Moreno began to criticize the 76-year-old president amid a worsening
pandemic, which in turn provoked Duterte to mock Moreno's former life as an
actor. Moreno has also condemned the emerging corruption allegations involving
the Duterte government's procuring of pandemic-related goods and equipment at
inflated prices.
As he appealed to
Filipinos for support Wednesday, Moreno took a swipe at Duterte's often crude
public pronouncements.
"Yes,
I grew up being poor," Moreno said. "But I have never been
bad-mannered. Although I've lived in the trash, not once did I become
foul-mouthed."
For his part President Duterte, who cannot seek a second term under the country's constitution, has confirmed he will run for the vice presidency, a move his critics say is merely a bid to extend his time in power in the hope of avoiding a legal reckoning over his human rights record.
The International Criminal Court, which Duterte scorns,
has launched a formal investigation into possible
crimes against humanity in connection with the government's drug war.
According to some
analysts, as a candidate Moreno is perceived by the Duterte family as perhaps
its toughest rival. In his brief time as mayor, he has also earned praise for
cleaning up the streets and building new housing for the poor.
Moreno's rags-to-riches story is also
seen as inspirational, and his relative youth offers the promise of
generational change in a country where 48% of the population of nearly 110
million people are under the age of 25.
"Isko
resonates with the 'regular guy' image of Duterte minus the cursing and
misogyny," says Jean Encinas-Franco, an associate professor of political
science at the University of the Philippines. "He is also telegenic and
youthful. Hence, it is easy to package him as representing change." (Julie
McCarthy / NPR)
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