MANNY PACQUIAO TO RUN FOR PRESIDENT

The former professional boxer Manny Pacquiao has announced that he will be running for president in the Philippines’ 2022 election.

The 42-year-old has been nominated as a candidate by a faction of the PDP-Laban ruling party.

Once he retired as a professional boxer, Pacquiao became a politician and is currently in senator in the Philippines’ parliament. He became a politician in 2010 when he was elected as a congressman.

While he is a popular figure in his home country, many are worried that he will win purely based on his success as a fighter, rather than what he can do as a politician.

As part of his announcement that he is now an official candidate for the presidency in his home country, he pledged that he will campaign against poverty and corruption.

Accepting the nomination, he said: “I am a fighter, and I will always be a fighter inside and outside the ring,” the BBC reports.

Under the country’s constitution, the current president Rodrigo Duterte is only allowed to serve one term. He is a very popular president and has since announced that he will run for the vice presidency.

Image credit: LA Times