Sara skipped it; Liza loved it
The contrasting reactions mirrored the vastly different relationships the two women have with the President.
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The contrasting reactions mirrored the vastly different relationships the two women have with the President.
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Vice President Sara Duterte did not watch President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s fifth State of the Nation Address (SoNA).
First Lady Liza Araneta-Marcos could not stop watching it.
“I have no plans to watch it. It’s a waste of time,” Duterte told reporters in The Hague, Netherlands, hours before the President addressed a joint session of Congress.
Asked whether she would at least read news reports about the speech, Duterte replied: “No.”
The First Lady, meanwhile, said she “couldn’t help but shed a tear” as she watched her husband deliver the address.
“Every SoNA reminds me of the countless hours, the sacrifices and the heart my husband pours into serving our country. I couldn’t be prouder of the man he is and the leader he strives to be,” she wrote on Facebook.
The contrasting reactions mirrored the vastly different relationships the two women now have with the President.
Marcos and Duterte ran together under the defunct “UniTeam” in the 2022 elections. But soon after their victory, they had a major falling out. Now she never misses a chance to get back at her erstwhile ally.
The Vice President also dismissed Marcos’ promise to prosecute those behind the anomalous flood control projects.
“Didn’t he also say last year that before December someone would be imprisoned? Has anyone been imprisoned? No,” Duterte said.
“So don’t expect the former speaker or members of the House of Representatives to go to jail,” she added.
In his SoNA, Marcos announced that the Office of the Ombudsman was preparing multiple cases against his cousin, former House Speaker Martin Romualdez, and vowed to prosecute those responsible regardless of political ties.
For the First Lady, one of the speech’s defining moments was when the President declared that Filipinos are “respectful, dignified ... and we do not yield” in defending the country’s sovereign rights in the West Philippine Sea.
“This time next year will be my husband’s last SoNA,” she wrote as she thanked members of the administration for their “loyalty, hard work, and quiet sacrifices.”
For the third consecutive year, Duterte did not attend the President’s annual address. She first skipped the 2024 SoNA when she appointed herself the administration’s “designated survivor.”
