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PHILIPPINES: Arroyo fights corruption charges - 07/02/2008

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PHILIPPINES: Arroyo fights corruption charges - 07/02/2008 Empty PHILIPPINES: Arroyo fights corruption charges - 07/02/2008

Post by adabogs Fri Feb 08, 2008 11:36 pm

Filipino president Gloria Arroyo is once again using all her political armour to fight off the latest corruption allegations against her. But in this case the charges are coming from the man who was once her closest political ally. Jose de Venecia has just been ousted as Speaker of the House of Representatives. It's said to be payback after his businessman son testified that Mrs Arroyo's husband received lucrative kickbacks from a state contract. Now the former speaker has his own serious charges to make against the woman he's spent much of his career protecting.

Presenter - Joanna McCarthy. Speaker - Satur Ocampo, member of the opposition Bayan Muna party
Heherson Alvarez, vice president of Lakas CMD party.

Listen to windows media

MCCARTHY: It was Jose de Venecia's last appearance as speaker of the house.

In a dramatic, often emotional speech, he laid out a range of allegations against President Gloria Arroyo.

He acknowledged they'd once been close allies.

She was his former running mate ten years ago.

He'd lobbied former president Estrada to appoint her to cabinet.

And the three times the opposition tried to impeach her, he'd been the one to round up the numbers to keep her in office.

But in Filipino politics, it seems nothing's as strong as family ties.

ALVAREZ: Well they've had a falling out, and the falling out may have been for some other reason, but principally because of accusations made by his son, Joey, against the first gentleman of the ZTE deal

MCCARTHY: That's Heherson Alvarez, the vice president of Jose de Venecia's party.

Mr de Venecia's son, Joey, told a senate committee Mrs Arroyo's husband received 70 million US dollars from a state contract - a contract in which Joey was a losing bidder.

In the political fallout that followed, Mr de Venecia took the allegations even further - implying before congress that Mrs Arroyo rigged the 2004 presidential polls.

Hours after the speech, Mr de Venecia was removed as parliamentary speaker by a vote of nearly three quarters of the house.

Opposition member of the Bayan Muna party, Saturo Campo, has no doubt Mrs Arroyo and her two congressmen sons were behind it.

CAMPO: Well it's been amply shown in the voting that the hand of the President or the presidential palace and particularly the open activities of the two children, two sons of the President, the congressmen, Mikey and Diosdado, that the ousting of the speaker Jose de Venecia was orchestrated by the office of the president to her two sons in congress. It is generally perceived of their retaliation on the speaker for the disclosure by his son, Joey de Venecia in a senate investigation implicating the husband of the president.

MCCARTHY: The feud's been described as an example of how politics works in the Philippines - two elite families squabbling over the spoils of office.

But Mrs Arroyo has also made a powerful enemy - a man described as a political fixer, businessman and dealmaker.

He's still close to former president Fidel Ramos and his Lakas CMD party now has to decide whether he'll stay party president.

Party vice president Heherson Alvarez appears to be standing by him.

ALVAREZ: There has been talk that one in the party will move for his removal from the presidency of Lakas.

MCCARTHY: Would you support his removal from the party as president?

ALVAREZ: I don't think so, I think this will have to be decided in a focused or generalised meeting of the directorate. I have to be able to state very clean grounds why he has to be removed. At this point in time there has been accusation of party disloyalty and asking for his removal.

MCCARTHY: Do you think he has been disloyal to the party though by raising these allegations?

ALVAREZ: Well when he delivered that speech he was reminding everybody of services to the party. My understanding is that that speech was not an accusation against the President, but a statement of his loyalty and he does not deserve the treatment he was getting from members of the party.

MCCARTHY: And opposition member Saturo Campo says he'll support another impeachment bid against Arroyo if there's more evidence brought against her.

But he says so far the numbers would still appear to be on her side.

CAMPO: It remains to be seen whether the combination of the forces of opposition and the small minority can reduce one-third of the total number of the house necessary to make an impeachment complaint go through the senate.
adabogs
adabogs
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Masipag na Mamamayan

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