NPC may yet support Escudero’s candidacy

MANILA, Philippines—The political party Sen. Francis Escudero has abandoned may end up supporting his candidacy if he does run in next year’s presidential election.

Officials of the Nationalist People’s Coalition kept this option open during an emergency meeting called shortly after Escudero, hitherto the party’s perceived standard-bearer, announced that he was bolting the party.

“There remains the option that we will continue supporting Chiz (Escudero’s nickname) if he runs for President and still field a full NPC slate,” former Sen. Vicente “Tito” Sotto III, an NPC member who was present at the gathering, told the Inquirer on Thursday.

Sotto conceded that his party was left with no substitute for Escudero for presidential candidate even as it was also preparing a full slate both in the national and local elections.

“No NPC member has signified his intention to run for President—that’s the problem,” he said.

Sotto, also the chairman of the Dangerous Drugs Board, admitted that Escudero’s departure from the NPC “demoralized” some members.

“I won’t call it a dilemma, but it’s a real problem because you suddenly lost a presidential candidate,” he said.

In the meeting attended by some 30 members at the so-called NPC clubhouse on Balete Drive, Quezon City, at noon Wednesday, Sotto said the party came up with two other possible courses of action in the wake of Escudero’s resignation from the party.

Sotto said the top option would be for the party to ignore Escudero's decision and proceed with its full lineup of candidates, from the vice president down to the mayors.

In that case, he said the NPC would still be in search of a standard-bearer.

“Just because a presidential candidate or a single member of the NPC left doesn’t mean the rest won’t move anymore,” he said in Filipino.

The third—and purportedly last—option was for the NPC to coalesce with other political parties such as the administration’s Lakas-Kampi-CMD, Sen. Manuel Villar’s Nacionalista Party, and Sen. Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III’s Liberal Party.

Sotto said the third option could be a long shot judging by the reaction of some NPC members in the Wednesday gathering.

He said some of them were vocal in their objection to the idea of coalescing with the ruling party, while others rejected a coalition with former Joseph Estrada’s Partido ng Masang Pilipino.

Sotto said the choice of political party to coalesce with would also depend on its availability to accommodate the NPC’s perceived vice presidential candidate, Sen. Loren Legarda.

So far, he noted that only Villar and Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro, the preferred standard-bearer of Lakas-Kampi, were without a running-mate.

Legarda had earlier rejected the invitation to run with Teodoro.

Sotto said the NPC agreed to determine its course of action during its general assembly on Nov. 5.