From Mario Taguiwalo: former Undersecretary of Health

An Immoral President Undeserving to Stay in Power

Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo became president in 2001 as a
consequence of the outrage of Filipinos with
corruption at the highest levels related to illegal
gambling. Now witnesses have testified at the Senate
that the husband, son and brother-in-law of this same
president have received pay offs from illegal
gambling.

Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo wanted her own electoral
mandate in 2004 in order to finally set aside any
doubts about her legitimacy to govern as president.

Now a recording has surfaced that shows her conspiring
with her own appointed COMELEC commissioner to rig the
results of that elections.

This is an immoral president. She betrays the very
principles upon which she rose to power and she
violates the very laws she swore to uphold when she
took office.

We will not accept this immoral president as our
president, and we demand that she resign immediately.
Let other leaders with greater legitimacy and moral
authority decide how our country shall be governed.
Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has lost all moral basis to
remain in power.

This is a statement of utter disgust. Maybe declaring
to all and sundry, in the words of the Peter Finch
character in the movie "Network":- "I am mad as hell
and I wont take this anymore!"- is not a wise
political move. Nonetheless, I still believe it
captures the sense of moral outrage in a woman who
blithely ignored our disgust with Marcos who stole
another election and Estrada whose family wallowed in
corruption.

Our President should be measured by a tougher
yardstick than ordinary defenseless citizens like you
and I because she has extraordinary powers and
authorities. If we will always depend on proof beyond
reasonable doubt to determine if a President has met
the standards of morality in public service then in
truth both Marcos and Erap did not deserve to be
ousted.

The President has a personal responsibility for her
relatives in government mainly because they would have
been unlikely to be in their positions in the first
place if she were not President. The President had a
duty to expedite a thorough investigation and clear
resolution of jueteng pay-off accusations against
members of her family in order to assure the people
that her relatives have been behaving responsibly
while in power. The President also had a duty to
immediately establish the authenticity of the
wiretapped recordings the minute these surfaced. Her
behavior of evasion, obfuscation, avoidance and total
lack of transparency are logical bases for concluding
that these recordings are authentic. Ask yourself, if
these recordings were indeed manufactured or
simulated, why did the government not immediately send
these to the FBI, Scotland Yard and whatever
authoritative laboratory there is in the world to
demonstrate indeed that these are fraudulent.

More than a week after these recordings emerged, what
is this government doing? Trying to scare everyone
else from listening or airing or discussing these
recordings. In both these cases of jueteng and the
tapes, the President would have been greatly boosted
and strengthened by a thorough, rigorous and prompt
process of getting to the truth about these
controversies, if the truth indeed is that her
relatives did not profit from illegal gambling and
that the recordings are fraudulent. The President has
the power, resources and opportunity to let the truth
defend her. Yet what does this President do? Avoid,
accuse others of destabilization, ignore demands for
her to confront the issues directly.

I make no claims that I have legal basis to demand the
President's resignation. Our President, however, must
meet a moral duty to sustain the people's belief in
the truth particularly with regards to matters
concerning corruption involving her family and, even
more important, concerning questions about her
legitimacy to her position. In my view, the President
has failed in this moral duty to the truth in the
public mind, a failure that will cause continued
disruption and disturbance among our people, and a
failure that can only drag our country down to
political instability and economic stagnation. I am
unwilling to accept the principle that the President
remains in power until proven guilty beyond reasonable
doubt because such a principle will only encourage our
presidents to dare us citizens to catch them
red-handed. Our President must offer a moral center
for our most valued civic virtues which should include
personal honesty, perceptions of being personally
honest, a reputation
not to stand by any acts of dishonesty, and readiness
to act in resolving any public doubts about one's
honesty. Our people must have sound basis to trust in
their President otherwise that President cannot truly
lead or unite them. I am convinced this President has
utterly failed in providing such a basis for trust.

Some have raised the need for reasonable proof.
Suppose in fact Mikey and Iggy Arroyo were merely
framed, unjustly accused by professional liars without
any proof. Suppose further that GMA was also framed
with recordings that were manufactured but which in
fact did not happen. And for the past week and into
the second week the nation has been turned upside down
by these vile criminals who merely made up all these
accusations without basis. What does that make of our
dear President,commander-in-chief, top law enforcer
and administrator of the state apparatus? Unable to
find and punish the criminals who made all these up?
Unable even to defend the innocent- who are dear to
her, namely her son,brother-in-law and herself- from
trumped up charges and manufactured evidence? Unable
even to demonstrate to all of us willing to believe
her that all these are lies and utterly without basis?

Incompetent some say. I say her incompetence is really
the unavoidable face of her immorality in the midst of
its unmasking.

We all know that Presidents, like us mortals, shit. We
might even have heard rumours that Presidents shit in
places they should not. For the past week and into the
second week, however, GMA's shit has been sitting in
our living rooms, buzzing with flies, and smelling
like death. We are waiting and hoping she can come out
to explain that the shit is someone else's or even
that the shit is merely imaginary. All we have heard
so far is that the shit is illegal and therefore
Malacanang shall not comment on illegal shit. We have
even heard some people say that that is not so much
shit, for all we know FPJ shit much more, and in any
case that shit did not really matter in the last
elections. I think this why they call these scandals -
a condition or event that so offends our sense of
propriety and disgraces those who are associated with
it.#