PRESIDENTIAL candidate Rodrigo Duterte on Sunday again slammed administration standard bearer Manuel Roxas II for the "sorry state of the Metro Rail Transit 3 and for protecting the business interests of illegal miners."
Duterte also said rogue policemen would be his first target in case he won the presidency this year.
“They will be the first to go if they are into drugs,” Duterte told a wildly cheering crowd at the Tagum City New City Hall late Saturday afternoon.
Senator Aquilino Pimentel III, Duterte’s candidate for vice president, said key figures were crossing party lines to back Davao City Mayor Duterte to have someone in Malacañang whose heart belongs to Mindanano.
“We are proud of him,” Pimentel said of Duterte.
Duterte, meanwhile, said he had found a “powerful ally” in Pope Francis in his fight against drugs.
“As a Catholic, I am proud that Poe Francis has taken the courage to name the issue and face down narcopolitics,” Duterte said.
Duterte has consistently expressed his outrage against law enforcers who are involved in crime but Saturday was the first time he declared he would go after them first.
He also claimed Roxas was involved in several anomalies when he was Transport secretary and then Interior secretary.
He also slammed President Benigno Aquino III over his failed Straight Path, saying the Aquino administration had make the life of the Filipino people more miserable.
“You, the Filipino people, you are the witnesses to what is happening to this country,” he told the 20,000 crowd in Tagum City.
He criticized the government’s failure to address the worsening traffic situation, the shakedown of travelers at the airports and the MRT contract mess.
Duterte said Roxas was using a plane owned by a controversial miner in Surigao.
“Why did you go into this?” he said.