INTERNATIONAL BOXING ICON MANNY Pacquiao formally filed his certificate of candidacy (COC) for president of the Philippines in Pasay City on Friday, 1st October.
The eight-division world champion and Philippine senator announced his retirement from the ring last Wednesday.
The Philippines has kicked off its election season with thousands of candidates vying for national and local posts.
Pacquiao, who has been serving as a senator of the Philippines since 2016, filed his certificate of candidacy (COC) for President last week at in Pasay City.
The senator filed his COC together with his running mate Buhay party-list representative Lito Atienza.
In his speech after filing his COC, Pacquiao vowed to help the people recover from poverty amid the COVID-19 pandemic by focusing on the economy, internet connectivity, and electricity, among others if elected.
He also assured that he will be putting an end to corruption in government.
“To all those taking advantage of our people and stealing from government, your days are numbered already,” Pacquiao was quoted as havimg said by local media.
“They all need to go to jail together in order to give justice to our people, for the economy to grow, and allow true change to happen,” he added.
Pacquiao has the support of three political parties – namely the Partido Demokratiko Pilipino–Lakas ng Bayan (PDP-Laban), Probinsya Muna Development Initiative (Promdi), and the People’s Champ Movement (PCM).
In an interview, Pacquiao said the problems currently faced by PDP-Laban forced him to seek an alliance with other political parties.
“Because we have a problem in the party, we opted to just use Promdi in our CONA (certificate of nomination and acceptance),” he said.
Meanwhile, Pacquiao said he chose Atienza as his running mate citing the experience and sincerity of the latter in helping the people in all his years in public service.
“I saw his sincerity, expertise, and real desire to help the country,” he said.
If Pacquiao does win the Philippines presidency, he will have the company of African footballing great George Weah as company in the rhecent past for a sporting icon who was elected to lead his country. Weah was elected president of Liberia in the 2017 election, and sworn as leader of the West African nation on 22 January 2018.
