Ejercito to use 'Estrada' nickname in run for reelection

MANILA, Philippines – Sen. Joseph Victor Ejercito on Monday filed his certificate of candidacy to seek a second term at the Senate.

Ejercito, who ran under the United Nationalist Alliance in 2013, will be running under the Nationalist People's Coalition in the 2019 elections.

.@jvejercito: I will be addressed as JV Ejercito, but JV Estrada is just nickname @PhilstarNews pic.twitter.com/GcnzmZWUsF

— Rosette Adel (@rosette_adel) October 15, 2018

The senator, whose legal names is Jose Victor Gomez Ejercito, will use the name "Ejercito Estrada JV (NPC)" on the ballot.

He said in earlier interviews that he left the party his father, former president and incumbent Manila Mayor Joseph Estrada, formed with Vice President Jejomar Binay for the 2013 polls over "differences in principles" with some members of the party.

He took his oath before Senate President Vicente "Tito" Sotto III, leader of the NPC, last week.

Ejercito filed his COC before half-brother Jinggoy Estrada, who is also planning to return to the Senate. He said he would use "JV Estrada" as a campaign nickname. 

The senator had earlier said that not using his father's screen name had affected his performance on surveys on senatorial candidates. 

In a Social Weather Stations survey conducted in September, Ejercito had a voter preference of just 19 percent, slightly behind reelectionist Sen. Paolo Benigno Aquino IV's 22 percent.

In contrast, Estrada was at sixth place with a voter preference of 31 percent.

Ejercito chairs the Senate committees on Health and Demography, and Urban Planning, Housing and Resettlement.