Last two minutes

It’s the last two minutes. And it looks like Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio will not disappoint the skeptics who from the start saw nothing but a “Sarazwela” in her avowed disinterest in seeking the presidency.

Yesterday, President Duterte’s daughter resigned from the regional party that she founded, Hugpong ng Pagbabago, and joined the Lakas-Christian Muslim Democrats of former president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Mayor Sara needs a national party that has fielded a standard bearer for 2022, so she can be the substitute candidate.

That would make Inday Sara truly her father’s daughter – taking a page from his playbook for eleventh-hour substitution in 2015, and going back on her repeated pronouncements that she is no “last-two-minutes” candidate.

Her supporter and chat mate, Albay Rep. Joey Salceda, told us on One News’ “The Chiefs” Monday night that as early as May this year, Inday Sara had already planned to run for president, but certain roadblocks got in the way.

Among these, Salceda said, were the scenarios presented by the PDP-Laban faction of Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi: a Duterte-Duterte tandem, which she is said to be truly against, or a tandem with the party’s current bet for vice president, Sen. Bong Go (also a no-go for Inday Sara, for reasons that Salceda would rather not delve into).

Isn’t Mayor Sara worried about her falling ratings in the reputable surveys? (Fly-by-night surveys are sprouting like poisonous mushrooms these days.) Salceda attributes her eight-point fall in the last survey not to the drag from her father’s sliding numbers, but from Inday Sara’s filing of candidacy for reelection as city mayor.

And Salceda is confident that her numbers will recover once she files her candidacy for president.Especially if the two PDP-Laban factions bury the hatchet – not in each other’s backs – and unite to support President Duterte’s candidates.

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There are apparent efforts to end the party rift. Last Monday the President met at Malacañang with Sen. Manny Pacquiao, who is the standard-bearer of the party faction headed by Sen. Koko Pimentel.

Malacañang said it was just a friendly meeting, with no politics discussed, and it was Pacquiao who asked for it. But Salceda said the rumor was that the meeting was part of efforts to unite the two factions.

There are also rumors that with the unity efforts, Pacquiao is being eyed as Inday Sara’s running mate.

Never mind the PDP-Laban’s bets, Senators Ronald dela Rosa and Bong Go, who will remain as candidates at the pleasure of President Duterte. The question is where a Sara-Pacman tandem would leave Ferdinand Marcos Jr.

Last Wednesday, the party of Bongbong Marcos made it clear he does not intend to make way for Mayor Sara and slide down to the vice presidential race.

Marcos had the same message yesterday when asked by reporters if he would be Sara’s running mate. “I have nowhere else to go,” he said. “I entered this race not to play any of this substitution game.”

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Salceda’s reaction to this: Mayor Sara doesn’t even need a running mate. And he’s right; it’s the political reality in our country.

Maybe Bong Go, emotional earlier this week as he hinted that he might have to back out of the VP race, will get to pursue his bid after all, even if not in formal tandem with Mayor Sara.

Because our system makes political parties largely opportunistic alliances of convenience and ultimately irrelevant, Filipinos don’t even vote along party lines. Instead we cherry-pick our candidates, from the president down to barangay officials.

Mayor Sara doesn’t need a running mate, but she needs a national party if she is running for president.

The Lakas-CMD has fielded its executive director Anna Capela Velasco as standard-bearer and member Lyle Fernando Uy as running mate as the party continued to press Sara to seek the presidency.

Surigao del Sur 1st district Rep. Prospero Pichay Jr., Lakas-CMD secretary general, initially said in interviews that the two unknowns were placeholders until Nov. 15, but backtracked later, saying he didn’t even know what a placeholder was.

Yesterday Inday Sara took her oath as Lakas-CMD member. She had stood as sponsor together with Bongbong Marcos at the wedding of Sen. Bong Revilla’s daughter at the Revilla farm in Silang, Cavite.

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President Duterte is surely pleased; he has become a “doting father” to his headstrong eldest child, Salceda told us.

If Mayor Sara would be pitted against Marcos, it would split the administration votes, already riven by the infighting in PDP-Laban. And if Pacquiao also does not become Sara’s running mate, he will eat into the administration votes as well.

Salceda, on the other hand, noted that when Sara’s ratings in the survey for presidential aspirants fell following her mayoral reelection bid, the candidate who got the most substantial ratings bump was Vice President Leni Robredo.

But Robredo’s ratings jump looked more likely due to her declaration, finally, of her presidential bid. I can’t imagine Duterte supporters ever switching to the pinks.

Isn’t Mayor Sara’s camp worried that she might be pulled down by her father’s continuing ratings slide?

Salceda, citing Wikipedia, says Duterte-Carpio is perceived to be a strong-willed person who acts independently of her father.

Still, Mayor Sara is now acting more like dad, going back on her word and pursuing his substitution tack.

And she carries the Duterte surname. If Inday Sara seeks the presidency and wins, it would mark the first dynastic handover of power in our country.

Sara Duterte-Carpio clearly spells continuity for the current dispensation. Inevitably, her campaign platform will be seen as a promise of more of the same.