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Davao City: Mayor Rodrigo Duterte kept mum on the
victory of his fellow Davaoeño, Prospero Nograles who was chosen as
the new Speaker of the House.
“No, there’s none,” said
Alex Roldan, head of the City Information and Production Division,
when asked of Duterte’s reaction to Nograles’ rise to the House
speakership. “And I don’t think there’s any forthcoming
[statement].”
In the past couple of weeks,
Duterte had been asked several times during local media conferences
to comment on the possibility of having a Davaoeño as House speaker
in the person of Nograles. Invariably, Duterte would dismiss the
question by saying there are other more urgent and important matters
he would rather discuss.
Nograles and Duterte’s short
and shaky political alliance finally broke late last year when the
latter accused the congressman of masterminding the arrest of a
political supporter, an alleged fugitive, during the mayor’s local
television show, Gikan sa Masa, Para sa Masa.
This on-air tirade started a word
war between the two most politically prominent personalities in
Davao City, with Duterte accusing Nograles, a third-termer
congressman, of posturing to run for his post in the next elections.
Duterte, who is also on his third
term, is believed to be grooming his daughter, Vice-Mayor Sarah
Duterte, to replace him in 2010.
--Fort Nicolas
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