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Senator Manny Pacquiao is now the chairman of President Rodrigo Duterte’s PDP-Laban party, a party official said Wednesday night.
The party’s executive director, Ron Munsayac, said President Lord Allan Velasco was the party’s new executive vice president.
“Please welcome our new PDP-Laban Party Chairman Senator Manny Pacquiao and Executive Vice President Lord Velasco!” Munsayac said on Twitter.
The tweet had a photo of Senator Aquilino Pimentel III appearing to swear in the two party officials. Pacquiao replaced Pimentel, who is now executive vice president.
However, a statement from Munsayac said that Pacquiao was “interim national president” of the ruling party.
“Pimentel has transferred the practical day-to-day leadership of the party to one with new and ‘modern’ ideas and who has the time, energy and audacity to prepare the Party for the 2022 national and local elections,” Munsayac. said.
He added that the new party leaders will work “very closely” with their president Duterte.
Let’s welcome our new @PDPLABAN Party Chairman Senator Manny Pacquiao and Executive Vice President Lord Velasco! pic.twitter.com/xDNxE8IvnH
– Ron Munsayac (@RonMunsayac) December 2, 2020
In June this year, Top Rank promoter Bob Arum said boxer-turned-senator Pacquiao had plans to run for president in 2022.
“The first president that I think we’ll have as a fighter is little Manny Pacquiao, who told me, once again, I made a Zoom phone call with him, ‘Bob, I’m running in 2022 and when I win, I want you there in my inauguration, ‘”he said.
Pacquiao, 41, will end his first term as a senator in 2022 after winning a Senate seat in the 2016 election.
As early as 2016, Duterte had declared that the boxer would become president.
Pacquiao and presidential spokesman Harry Roque were recently criticized for attending mass gatherings where health protocols such as social distancing were violated amid the coronavirus pandemic.
They both welcomed possible investigations into their violations.
-NB, GMA News
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