Villar likely to pick Loren

MANILA, Philippines - Nacionalista Party standard-bearer Sen. Manuel Villar has narrowed down his choices for vice president to Senators Francis Escudero and Loren Legarda. But it looks like it will be Legarda.

He said the NP committee in charge of choosing his vice president has not yet decided but he would not mind working with either of the two senators.

Escudero and Legarda were supposed to be the tandem of the Nationalist People’s Coalition (NPC) for the 2010 elections. Escudero, however, resigned from  the party on Wednesday and announced that he is continuing his bid for the presidency independently.

Legarda, on the other hand, announced that she is running for vice president under NPC.

During a forum of the Manila Overseas Press Club, Villar dropped hints that he would be running with Legarda.

First, he said he would likely give the environment department to his vice president. Legarda’s advocacy is environmental protection.

He said they share the same advocacies.

“I like the environment. I’ve never claimed to be an environmentalist but I have planted more than a million trees in my lifetime. I’ve been planting trees for the past 25 years and as of my latest count, I have crossed the million mark. I like trees because they beautify the surroundings. I started planting trees even before we started talking about global warming,” Villar said.

Second, Villar does not mind that Legarda was one of those who supported his ouster as Senate president last year on allegations that he benefited from the C-5 road project.

“Because they called for an investigation. But they heard the witnesses and a lot of them have changed their minds already. Somehow the issue has become clear to them that there is nothing wrong with that project and I am not guilty of anything. In fact, I’m very proud of that project,” Villar said.

Legarda has said she is now open to run with other presidential bets after Escudero left the NPC.

Villar said he would like to end the guessing game as soon as possible but would need to wait until the middle of November before he announces his running mate.

“The last day of filing (of certificate of candidacy) is November 30, we feel that November 15 is a good deadline and we intend to beat that and at the same time we are also finalizing the senatorial lineup. We are very confident that we can come up with a complete lineup as early as the end of first week of November,” Villar said.

Asked if Legarda has an edge, Villar said: “To be fair, environment is a very serious, very important objective. But that is not the only objective. Capability as a president is also very important. I will not immediately rule out the other possibilities.”

He also clarified that Escudero is not applying to be his vice president.

Villar said NP would like to cooperate with other parties to make sure that the 2010 elections would be clean and fair especially now that a new system would be used.

“(Poll) automation. It’s not fair for me to say that that will be a problem but I’m worried about it,” Villar said.

He said it would be tough to guard the votes and everyone must make sure that the system would not break down, leading to failure of elections.

“We want everybody to campaign to discourage anybody from tampering the election results or trying to stop the elections. It is important for the process to continue. It is important that people campaign and people guard their votes so that the system will work. The more difficult it is to tamper, the less is the probability that there will be tampering,” Villar said.