The 58-year-old former legislator says he was honoured to be endorsed by Mr Aquino as the standard bearer of the dominant Liberal Party.
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Aquino said he picked Roxas because “he has the competence, he has no other boss except the people, who owes no one a debt of gratitude, who has no interest except the nation’s”.
“I trust Mar Roxas because he has presidential blood”, said Aya Barnedo, a 38-year-old cook from Camarines Sur province who traveled by bus for eight hours to witness the endorsement event.
The Philippines elects a new leader in May 2016.
Roxas lost as Aquino’s running mate in the 2010 vice presidential race. “I will never deviate from the ‘straight path.'”.
Roxas vowed to continue the reforms that the Aquino administration had started.
“I doubt Aquino’s endorsement will be a game changer”, said Richard Javad Heydarian, an assistant political science professor at De La Salle University.
Untainted by corruption, unlike many Filipino politicians, he is a close friend of Aquino and is seen by many as a safe pick to carry the torch of the latter’s reformist presidency.
According to recent polls, Roxas trails Binay, whose populist policies as mayor of Manila’s financial district succeeded in winning the hearts of the area’s poor.
Senator Poe, after wishing Roxas well and pledging support for Aquino’s corruption fight, remained coy about her political ambitions.
Aquino, who will complete his six-year term next year, stressed the importance of having an ally carry on the achievements of his administration because if the country’s economic trend continues, a government assessment shows the Philippines can become a first-world country within the next generation.
Dumped at a church as a baby and adopted by popular Filipino film action hero Fernando Poe, who died shortly after losing the 2004 presidential election, the younger Poe was a surprise top vote-getter in the 2013 senatorial ballot.
“I do not wish to open the possibility for an individual to stay in power their whole life”, Aquino said, adding that he has rejected calls to rewrite the constitution.
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Aquino’s mother led a bloodless revolt that eventually toppled Marcos in 1986.
