Delayed start, long speech, singing President

MANILA, Philippines — He was over an hour late, and his speech ran much longer than he promised.

Due to bad weather, President Duterte arrived more than an hour late for his fourth State of the Nation Address (SONA) at the Batasan complex yesterday, where he delivered his speech – originally intended to last 40 minutes – for about an hour and a half.

The Presidential Security Group (PSG) said Duterte was still at the Bahay ng Pagbabago at Malacañang at 4:20 p.m. He was supposed to deliver his annual address at 4 p.m. at the Batasang Pambansa.

The PSG said cloudy skies and sporadic rains in Quezon City forced their party to leave way past 4 p.m.

At the time, the presidential helicopter was still waiting for a go-signal to take off. Duterte arrived with Sen. Bong Go at 4:55 p.m., the most tardy so far for Duterte’s SONA.

The joint session of the 18th Congress was called to order at 5:08 p.m. and he began delivering his speech at 5:15 p.m.

Midway through his address, the President joked that he had promised to end his speech in 40 minutes, and that he could cut it if the audience wanted him to.

The 74-year-old Chief executive mostly stuck to his prepared speech – reading from a teleprompter – but in some instances, opted to ad lib as usual.

Duterte went off-script when he lashed out at five slow-performing government agencies –Land Transportation Office (LTO), Social Security Service (SSS), Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR), Land Registration Authority (LRA) and Pag-Ibig.

In his past SONAs, Duterte also veered from his written speech when he touched on particular pet peeves.

After delivering his SONA, Duterte joined the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra in singing his favorite songs “Ikaw” and “Moon River.”

Duterte quipped that singing gives him a “sense of peace,” as he was a “prisoner” at Malacañang.

“I can’t even buy my Jockey (underwear),” he said, since being President means maintaining restricted movement due to security concerns.

Singing has been his pastime even when he was mayor. “It brings me comfort,” Duterte told the orchestra.

“(Singing) brings beauty to the soul… It brings you closer to God,” he said, inviting the group to a night of fellowship in Malacañang.