Clans’ Feud Dominates Philippines’ Midterms
Senate races crucial for Duterte camp’s political survival
By: Tita Valderama
The Philippines’ May 12 midterm polls, to elect 12 of the 24-member Senate and hundreds of local government officials, are a referendum between two warring clans, one led by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., the other by his once-partner, Vice President Sara Duterte as a stand-in for her father, Rodrigo R. Duterte, the former president now languishing in a United Nations Detention Unit in The Hague in the Netherlands.
A sideshow playing out is the likely demise of the political career – at least for now – of Imee Marcos, 69, the president’s powerful elder sister, who appears likely to lose her Senate seat and her central relationship in the Marcos coterie because of her friendship with and support of Sara Duterte.
The senior Duterte spent his 80th birthday in The Hague because he is accused of crimes against humanity based on his promises to fatten the fish of Manila Bay with the bodies of drug peddlers, which human rights organizations cited by the ICC say has led to 30,000 deaths of mostly poor drug users. The Duterte supporters believe Marcos broke his promise and let the United Nations’ International Criminal Court have him on March 11 after years of vain efforts to have him extradited, hurriedly flying him out on a Gulfstream G550 chartered by the president’s office.
Duterte allies’ benefit
Whether Marcos did or didn’t, sympathy for Duterte has catapulted two of his acolytes, Sens. Christopher "Bong" Go, his former special assistant, and Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa, his former police chief and drug war capo, into the top six among favored positions in the race to fill the 12 Senate seats up for grabs in the election. A third partisan disciple, popular variety television host Willie Revillame, is also newly in the running to make the 12-seat cut along with some lesser names. Although he is avowedly independent, Revillame is a likely Duterte backer.
These Senate positions are important because of the Senate leadership’s – and Marcos backers’ – long-stalled campaign to impeach Sara Duterte and extinguish her inevitable 2028 presidential challenge to the Marcos machine, expected to be led by House Speaker Martin Romualdez, 61, Marcos’s first cousin. Marcos allies are now believed to lead eight to nine of the 12 open seats. The question is whether that gives them the 16 votes – two-thirds of the upper house – for conviction.
Sara comes out swinging
After first promising last November that she would remain aloof, Sara has actively entered the fray for candidates endorsed by her father and against lawmakers who pushed for her impeachment. The midterm balloting is crucial for the Dutertes’ political survival. Buoyed by improving trust and approval ratings following the March 11 arrest and rendition of her father, Sara Duterte – dressed in T-shirt, rugged pants, and rubber shoes —trash talks in campaign sorties, cursing and ridiculing political opponents as her father did to the delight of supporters. But she falls short of discussing specific action plans to address problems of poverty, corruption, and incompetence.
Impeachment court to convene
The vice president’s impeachment court will convene in late July for her trial on various charges, including graft and corruption, bribery, and for threatening to have Marcos Jr., his wife, and the House Speaker killed if she is murdered, then repeating the threat.
The 12 senators to be elected on May 12 will join 12 incumbents who will serve as judges in the impeachment trial, in which a conviction would remove her from office and bar her from the 2028 run. But the Marcos-backed slate’s likely victory in the polls may not automatically mean a vote for conviction. Imee, for instance, has bolted the administration slate and sought out Sara’s endorsement, enraging the Marcos family.
Although Marcos has maintained that the service of the arrest warrant was dictated by the country’s commitment to Interpol, which pushed the warrant through the Philippine National Police, his approval and trust ratings have cratered, falling by 17 points from 42 percent in February to 25 percent in March, based on a survey by Pulse Asia. Sara Duterte’s rating improved by 7 points, from 52 percent in February to 59 percent in March.
Another reputable polling firm, OCTA Research, showed Marcos’s trust and performance rating dipping by 5 points, from 65 percent in November 2024 to 60 percent in April. Sara Duterte’s numbers improved, from 49 percent trust rating and 48 percent performance rating in November 2024 to 58 percent trust and 56 percent performance rating in April. OCTA noted: “This marks the lowest trust rating for President Marcos since the first quarter of 2024… A downward trend in his satisfaction ratings was observed since the July 2024 survey.”
Marcos’s trust ratings have been declining since 2024, from 64 percent in July, down to 57 percent in September, before sliding further to 54 percent in December. Duterte’s have also been sliding, from 65 percent in July to 55 percent in September, then further down to 52 percent in December.
Sara endorses would-be judges
Prior to the elder Duterte’s arrest, only Go and dela Rosa among the 10 candidates in his slate made it to the top 12 in preelection surveys. Later appraisals showed two others – actor Philip Salvador and party-list Representative Rodante Marcoleta – making it to the top 12, edging out two candidates under Marcos’ Alyansa para sa Bagong Pilipinas (Alliance for New Philippines) – Imee and outgoing Rep. Camille Villar.
Imee goes it alone
Imee and Villar, both from well entrenched political families, were reported to be the top spenders on campaign ads in this election, each breaching the PHP 1 billion mark (US17.9 million even before they filed their certificates of candidacy in October 2024. Despite their huge spending, their chances are still on the edge.
Pulse Asia’s February survey showed Imee’s rating dropping to 30.9 percent from January’s 43.4 percent, with her ranking for a Senate seat falling from fourth to 14th, below the crucial cutoff. Political analyst Ronald Llamas attributed her declining survey ratings to her neutral stance in the ongoing conflict between her brother and her friend, Sara Duterte.
Imee claimed to be instrumental in convincing Sara to become Marcos’s vice president in 2022. Her free fall in the surveys continues after the breakup of the alliance. On March 26, she left the administration-backed senatorial slate as she pursued a Senate investigation of what she described as Duterte’s illegal arrest. She skipped two administration campaign rallies in Tacloban and in Trece Martires, in both instances citing Duterte's arrest for her absence.
Imee bows out
"I cannot stand on the same campaign platform as the rest of the Alyansa,” she said. “As I have stated from the outset of the election period, I will continue to maintain my independence." She chose to stand alone, she said, “so that my [brother] will no longer be put in a difficult position, and my true friends won’t have to hesitate."
But on April 29, Imee blamed her brother’s administration for what she described as Duterte’s “politically motivated” arrest, carried out through “group effort,” and recommended that the Ombudsman investigate at least five key officials —the Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla, Interior Secretary Jonvic Remulla, Philippine National Police chief Gen. Rommel Francisco Marbil, Police Criminal Investigation and Detection Group chief Nicolas Torre III and Ambassador Markus V. Lacanilao – as possibly liable for graft, grave misconduct, usurpation of judicial functions, and arbitrary detention, among others, for sanctioning Duterte’s arrest.
Defend ‘til the end
As far back as 2023, Imee Marcos promised to defend the Dutertes “even if [she’s] the last one” to do so, invoking debt of gratitude because it was the former president who allowed her father, the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr., to be buried at the Libingan ng mga Bayani (Cemetery of Heroes) in November 2016. Sara has not only joined the campaign sorties of Marcos and Villar but has also brought Imee along to the rallies of local officials.
The former president is not endorsing Imee Marcos and Villar. How Sara’s endorsement of the two women aspirants can boost their survey standing has yet to be seen. Their rankings in the latest survey remain precarious. Should the two make it to the Senate, Sara can count on their votes. If they lose, Sara may have to kiss her ambition for higher office goodbye – along with Imee’s.