Danding's daughter to campaign for Noynoy

While Nationalist People's Coalition (NPC) chairman Eduardo "Danding" Cojuangco Jr. has kept silent on which among the nine presidential candidates he will support in the May elections, his daughter has started campaigning for Liberal Party bet Sen. Benigno Simeon "Noynoy" Aquino III. Cojuangco's daughter Lisa Cojuangco-Cruz is also campaigning for Aquino's running mate Sen. Manuel Roxas II, saying that she believes the Aquino-Roxas tandem is the best hope for a better Philippines. "I am not a politician, but as a Filipino I am making a choice and the choice for May 10 is Noy-Mar," she said in an interview posted on the Visayan Daily Star. “I am not one to give you a complicated analysis of things. All we need is an honest, decent government and our hope for that rests on Noynoy and Mar," she added. Cojuangco-Cruz is Aquino's second cousin and coincidentally, both were born on February 8, 1960, only seven hours apart. The LP standard-bearer's father, the late Sen. Benigno "Ninoy" Aquino Jr., stood as her baptismal godfather. LP campaign manager Florencio “Butch" Abad confirmed in a phone interview with GMANews.TV that Cojuangco-Cruz has indeed thrown her support behind Aquino and Roxas, and that she will join her cousin Kris on the campaign trail. When asked whether the elder Cojuangco himself has expressed any intention to support Aquino, however, Abad said they have not heard of any such plan by the business tycoon. The elder Cojuangco's wife, Gretchen, had earlier said she was open to supporting "anybody but Gibo," referring to administration bet Gilberto Teodoro Jr. Teodoro, whose mother Mercedes is Cojuangco's sister, had bolted NPC in favor of administration party Lakas-Kampi-CMD, which eventually chose him as its standard bearer. (See: Lakas-Kampi picks Teodoro as 2010 standard bearer) Cojuangco-Cruz said she will campaign in Negros Occidental, where the family has farms, and in Iloilo where she had also stayed for a time. She said she will hit the campaign trail on Thursday in Iloilo, where she will join Aquino’s celebrity sister Kris. Cojuangco-Cruz, a lupus erythematosus patient, is known for her advocacy to raise awareness of the disease. She heads The LUiSA (Lupus Inspired Advocacy) Project of the Philippine Rheumatology Educational Trust Foundation.—Johanna Camille Sisante/JV, GMANews.TV