One simple but devastating truth is becoming harder and harder to ignore about Vice President Sara Duterte: no matter how hard she tries to own the brand, she is no Rodrigo Duterte.

Some might say that is a blessing. After all, her father is in detention in The Hague, facing charges of crimes against humanity before the International Criminal Court. That is hardly a model worth emulating.

But for all Rodrigo Duterte’s many and very serious faults, two things about him were undeniable: He had political instincts sharpened by decades in the rough and tumble of local politics, and he had a natural charisma that let him charm voters, unsettle critics and dominate the public conversation almost at will.

VP Sara has neither.

Her recent pronouncements on the oil crisis have made that painfully clear. Of course, it is expected that she would use the moment to attack an administration she had long cut ties with. That’s simply politics.

But the way she has chosen to do so has felt curiously lifeless, as though every line was run through a focus group first and delivered only after a communications team had signed off on the tone.

When she urged government agencies to act on the looming price hikes, and then, in the broader Palace back and forth, allowed the impression to form that she had foreseen this war four years ago, the result was not awe or even amusement — it was ridicule. Instead of sounding prescient, she sounded ridiculous. Instead of sounding bold, she sounded rehearsed.

And that is really the problem. Rodrigo Duterte, whatever else one may say about him, had a feel for provocation. He knew how to say something outrageous in a way that felt spontaneous, dangerous and distinctly him. It was politically toxic in many ways, but it was undeniably effective.

Sara Duterte, by contrast, often sounds like she is reading bullet points prepared by a public relations firm determined to make her appear serious and composed. The trouble is that gravitas cannot be manufactured by flattening everything into talking points. What comes through instead is stiffness.

Even her recent declaration that she is running for president in 2028, which should have been a defining political moment, landed with much less force than her camp must have hoped. She remains the early survey frontrunner, yes, and her formal announcement in February got plenty of coverage.

But there is a difference between leading in early numbers and commanding the national imagination. We have seen before how quickly the latter can overtake the former.

Leni Robredo’s 7 October 2021 declaration, in contrast, was not just newsworthy. It became memorable, replayed and shared because it felt like a historic moment. Sara’s announcement, on the other hand, came and went with much less spark.

This matters because there are still more than two years before the election, and because the field is far from settled. A clear rival has yet to emerge. Corruption cases and impeachment threats still hang over her. And if this race becomes more genuinely competitive, the weaknesses that are easy to miss in a largely empty field may become glaring liabilities in a tight one.

Sara Duterte may still be formidable. But she is not her father. And as the road to 2028 gets shorter, louder, and more crowded, that difference may turn out to matter more than what the surveys say today.