MANILA, Philippines - Always the best man but never the groom.
President Aquino will again stand as best man at yet another wedding, this time to celebrity couple Dingdong Dantes and Marian Rivera of GMA-7, who will tie the knot in Quezon City at 3 p.m. today.
The 54-year-old bachelor Chief Executive is expected to be accompanied by his sister, popular talk show host Kris Aquino, when they attend the wedding at the Immaculate Concepcion Cathedral along New York street.
Dantes – Jose Sixto Dantes III in real life – was appointed by Aquino on Sept. 1 as commissioner-at-large of the National Youth Commission. He was among the celebrities who supported Aquino’s presidential campaign in May 2010.
Aquino was also best man at the wedding of singers Ogie Alcasid and Regine Velasquez in December 2010, six months after he assumed office.
When he was still a senator but was known to be vying for the presidency, Aquino stood as sponsor at the October 2009 wedding of then senator and now Interior Secretary Mar Roxas to ABS-CBN news anchor Korina Sanchez, who had been Aquino’s girlfriend in the late 1980s.
On Feb. 14 next year, Aquino will again be the best man at the wedding of his close friend and political ally, Sen. Francis Escudero, and his longtime girlfriend Heart Evangelista at the posh Balesin resort in Quezon province.
Escudero and Aquino were colleagues in the minority bloc at the House of Representatives – the former representing the first district of Sorsogon while the latter his home province of Tarlac. Both won a Senate seat in May 2007.
In June 2011, Aquino played the role of a “gentleman” at the golden wedding anniversary of Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago and her husband, former interior undersecretary Jun Santiago.
The senator served as Quezon City regional trial judge and immigration commissioner during the term of Aquino’s late mother, former President Cory Aquino, in the late 1980s. Santiago ran for president but lost to former Armed Forces chief Fidel Ramos in May 1992.
Aquino was invited to the January 2012 wedding of former Valenzuela councilor Shalani Soledad – another of his former girlfriends – to Pasig City Rep. Roman Romulo, who is an ally from the Liberal Party, but he did not attend.
Soledad’s relationship with Aquino was reportedly the longest the Chief Executive had. They became a couple in 2009 and broke up in October 2010.
Aquino has repeatedly stated that he does not want to be a godfather in any wedding since this might not give him the opportunity to marry. “I would like to be married too someday,” he said in jest in late 2010.
He said there was a Filipino belief that single men who become sponsors at a wedding would remain bachelors. Roxas told Aquino in 2009 it was not true because he stood as sponsor in many weddings before he himself decided to marry.
Aquino nevertheless told reporters before Roxas’ wedding in 2009 that he could not say no to his friend and former girlfriend. He agreed to stand as sponsor in place of his mother, who died in August 2009.