IN METICULOUS timing that was most certainly planned to the dot, Toni Gonzaga released a video interview with Manny Pacquiao in her YouTube talk show channel soon after yesterday's big confirmation from the PDP-Laban general assembly.
The vlog’s title? “Why Manny Pacquiao is Running For President.”
This new episode also comes a mere days after Gonzaga's controversial sit-down with Bongbong Marcos.
In the half-hour long interview with the actress, Pacquiao once again trotted an anti-corruption stance that looks to become his key campaign pillar. It would be, the senator said, the first salvo in a “22-round” action plan for the Philippines.
Calling corruption a “cancer”, he forecasted more poverty if the problem isn’t nipped in the bud.
He promised, “Ipapakulong natin ang lahat ng kawatan ng gobyerno.”
Gonzaga pushed back on the senator, asking him why his fight against corruption only became visible this year. Would it be because of the looming elections?
But Pacquiao claimed that, from the start of his senatorial term in 2016, he had already been leading anti-corruption probes. He cited an investigation into an P8 billion anomaly in the province of General Santos.
This was the same year that Pacquiao — once a staunch Duterte supporter — became one of the administration’s key allies in the unseating of the critical Leila de Lima. Now, of course, his ties with Duterte have been cut. Prior to his departure for the fight with Yordenis Ugas (then still booked with Errol Spence), he had fired broadsides against key administration figures, alleging widespread corruption.
“Di ako katulad ng mga trapong politiko,” he told Gonzaga. “Andito ako para sa bayan, hindi para sa sarili ko. Dahil gusto kong ipaglaban ang karapatan ng mga maliit na tao. Bubuwagin ko lahat nang corruption na yan hangga’t nandito ako sa gobyerno.”
Pacquiao answers anti-LGBT, Jinkee controversies
Gonzaga also asked him about a controversial statement he made back in 2016, when he said that the LGBT community was “worse than animals.”
Pacquiao claimed that his statements were misrepresented.
“Di ko kino-condemn yung mga gay, ang mga LGBT,” said Pacquiao.
Later on in the interview, when Pacquiao said, “Hindi ako worldly person,” Gonzaga asked him about the criticisms volleyed at his wife Jinkee Pacquiao on her display of wealth.
“Ang depensa ko lang naman doon is yung pera pinaghirapan ko, ang hard-earned money ko, in-enjoy lang namin, in-enjoy lang ng asawa ko. Ano’ng masama dun?” responded Pacquiao.
He added: “Biruin mo, dugo at pawis ang puhunan.”
Pacquiao tells Gonzaga about early matches
Gonzaga and Pacquiao also touched on the eight-division world champion’s boxing career, with Pacquiao admitting that he had cried after his first fight against Erik Morales.
“Di ba kasi, naputukan ako, tapos andaming dugo na nawala, dinala ako sa ospital,” he recalled. “Sa dami nang dugo na nawala, parang nag-blur yung paningin ko, tapos natalo ako.”
The 2014 match against Timothy Bradley was also broached, as this was the time that he’d completed his full conversion into Christianity.
“Natalo ako nun,” Pacquiao said, smiling. “Alam mo, nung time na yun, iba yung pakiramdam ko. Wala talagang, kahit percentage, na ma-discourage ako. Para sa akin, hindi mahalaga yung mga worldly things na yan. Importante, close ako sa Lord.”
Of course, the boxer jokingly drew the line between Pacquiao the Christian and Pacquiao the fighter.
“Pag nasa ring ka, kailangan fighter ka. Alisin mo muna yung —” he said, not finishing the sentence. “Pinapayagan kang saktan mo siya, pinapayagan ko ring saktan niya ako."
But he likes Manny Pacquiao the fighter “only in the ring,” he said.
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