No spare tire

In our system of government, the vice president is seen largely as a spare tire. Clearly, the incoming VP will have none of it.

Last Sunday was the first time that a vice president-elect was sworn in separately and nearly two weeks ahead of the president.

Sara Duterte’s inaugural speech was long on motherhood platitudes and short on solid plans for her VP role and the more demanding post of secretary of education.

But it’s early days yet and she can be given room to immerse herself in the portfolio that, according to some reports, was assigned to her by the Marcos camp instead of her preferred post as defense chief.

The Marcos camp has expressed confidence in her capability to handle the education portfolio. Bongbong Marcos has reportedly told Inday Sara to review the K-12 program.

People have noted that being a mother of school-age kids, the incoming VP-education chief will have an idea of what ails the country’s education system – and come up with measures to confront them.

In public, as we saw at the inaugural in Davao City, there’s warmth between Inday Sara and the Marcos power triumvirate (Ferdinand Jr., first lady Liza and Super Ate ng Presidente Imee).

The warmth was in marked contrast to the chill radiated by President Duterte, whose body language while watching in the audience and then joining his daughter and his ex-wife on stage spoke volumes about family ties.

Duterte seemed equally frosty toward his successor BBM. SAP Imee also had to walk across the stage and give Duterte a tap to say hello, as he moved to get the hell out of there.

But at least the President showed up at the event that coincided with Father’s Day, and Daughterte gave her sullen dad a hug.

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How the family dynamics will play out bears watching, since even this early, all arrows around the VP-elect appear to be pointing in the direction of a presidential run in 2028, under the Duterte surname rather than Carpio.

Why Inday Sara decided to drop her husband’s surname, we may never know. Surnames are a private matter. Also, this year’s winning pair seem to have an abiding belief that they don’t owe the public they are sworn to serve an explanation for anything.

But the Duterte brand certainly has greater political resonance than Carpio. The Carpio surname can also be confusing because there are two prominent Carpios in the opposition.

Following her early inaugural, Sara Duterte said she wanted to set up a permanent home for the Office of the Vice President.

She might want to look at the Coconut Palace at the Cultural Center of the Philippines complex, a project of Marcos matriarch Imelda.

Critics of the conjugal dictatorship had described the Coconut Palace as another manifestation of Imeldific’s “edifice complex” – worthy projects, but deemed ostentatious at the time, and with up to 80 percent of project costs suspected to end up in kickbacks.

The mindset at the time was tinged with aspirations of royalty, as we can glean from the fondness for calling structures “palaces” – the Coconut Palace, the Palace in the Sky, now crumbling in Tagaytay.

The Coconut Palace, spacious as it is, looks nothing like a palace, even after its renovation to serve as the office of Jejomar Binay when he was vice president. Coconut House would be a more fitting name. Nut House would be even better.

Binay received flak from his rivals within the yellow camp for his decision to use the Coconut Palace. But the renovation truly highlighted the beauty and usefulness of the coconut tree for construction and interior design.

Vice President Leni Robredo opted for smaller offices, and the Coconut Palace has lain idle for the past six years.

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Whether or not a vice president will be nothing more than a spare tire depends a lot on the president. But most of the VPs since the 1986 people power revolt carved out their own roles.

Salvador Laurel, who gave way to Corazon Aquino in the 1986 snap election, served as her VP and foreign minister (and concurrently for a month after the revolt, as prime minister) until their falling out a year later. Tita Cory dismissed Laurel as a pesky bangaw or gadfly.

Joseph Estrada shone as Fidel Ramos’ anti-crime czar. During a spree of ransom kidnappings targeting mostly the Tsinoy community, VP Erap delivered, thanks to his take-no-prisoners chief enforcer, Panfilo Lacson.

Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo kept her head down when she was Erap’s vice president, working with little fanfare as social welfare secretary. As fate would have it, however, the presidency fell into GMA’s lap, and she held on to it for all of nine years.

Her first VP, Teofisto Guingona, didn’t need her blessings to shine on his own; he had earned his spurs long before GMA entered politics. They also had a falling out after about a year and he quit as her foreign affairs chief. His elected successor, broadcaster Noli de Castro who was given the housing portfolio, seemed content to take on the role of a spare tire.

Binay was another VP who refused to be relegated to a spare tire. And VP Leni, despite the unrelenting put-downs by a misogynist president, carried out aid projects under her office.

The veeps who actively resisted the spare tire role were the ones who weren’t content with settling for No. 2; they were the ones who later ran for president.

We’ve had three chief executives so far who are children of former presidents: GMA, Noynoy Aquino and now Marcos Junior.

For the 2028 race, the betting these days is on incoming VP Daughterte.