MANILA - She did want justice. She did
desire the truth to come out. Above all, she
wanted her day in court. That was the plea from
Philippine President Gloria Arroyo in mid-July,
when the heavy, soot-laden Manila air resounded
with calls for her to step down over allegations
she rigged the 2004 elections.
The
opposition, which has yet to reveal a coherent
center of its own, took its fight off the streets
and into the halls of Congress, where, at the
opening of the session on July 25, opponents filed
an impeachment complaint against Arroyo. The
charge sheet contained a plethora of offenses, the
most important being the alleged blatant cheating
that swindled the Filipino electorate out of its
expressed will. Other charges included overpricing
of major infrastructure contracts and human-rights
abuses.
The plan from there was to gather
the required 79 signatures of approval from House
members, the magic number needed to
transmit the complaint to the
Senate, where senators would sit as judges over
the woman many are now convinced doesn't really
deserve the job.
The Philippine Senate is
a loose cannon for Arroyo, the last place she
wants an impeachment complaint to end up. This is
where the full story would come out live, every
day in front of a national TV and radio audience.
Not only that, only four of the 23 senators could
be considered rock-solid allies. Several senators,
including the Senate president, a long time ally,
abandoned her in July. Others have conspicuously
perched themselves on the fence. Without the
comfortable numbers in the Senate, her acquittal
would not be a sure thing.
But the House
of Representatives is a completely different
story. It is here where Arroyo enjoys an absolute
clear majority. This is where her loyal minions
could and would do everything to save their queen.
And their queen would do anything for them,
including administering a congressman's favorite
form of arm twisting; promises of funds released
for their pet projects and juicy positions for
relatives and friends.
On Tuesday, her
majority came through for her. The Philippine
opposition conceded defeat in a vote on whether to
impeach Arroyo, though said it would keep up its
campaign to unseat her through the courts and in
the streets. With more than half the 236 Lower
House votes cast, only 31 lawmakers had voted to
impeach Arroyo, leaving the opposition well short
of the 79 it needed to send Arroyo to a Senate
trial. As of now it looks as if Arroyo will not
have to face a public trial and almost certain
removal from office.
As she heads off to
New York this week to preside over the United
Nations Security Council, of which the Philippines
is a rotating member, she will no doubt hold her
head high. She had tried to get her diplomatic
corps to shield her from any inquiries from the
foreign media in New York. But her executive
secretary told her that wasn't possible. So now,
her impeachment has been killed and she can stand
before the world body and the accompanying media
and gloat that it was all pure harassment in the
first place.
But no matter what image she
projects in New York, Arroyo's troubles at home
are not even close to being over. In fact, there
are those who are saying that she has merely won
the first battle in this political war, but that
there are many more to come.
Even some of
her allies are saying the victory was a hollow one
for Arroyo, one that does nothing to clear her of
the serious allegations that are proving to be
more and more difficult to deny with each passing
day. The impeachment charges were not thrown out
because the opposition lacked enough evidence. The
opposition has mountains of evidence against her.
It all came down to a technicality, one that
Arroyo apparently blatantly exploited to her major
advantage.
There is a provision in the
Philippine constitution that states that not more
than one impeachment proceeding can be initiated
against a sitting president in the same year. The
logical reason for this is so the president of the
republic doesn't have to spend entire days
defending actions in court, while neglecting
duties.
In early July, a day after Arroyo
admitted on national television to calling an
unnamed elections commissioner to protect her
votes, lawyer Oliver Lozano walked into the
building housing the Philippine Congress and filed
a hastily produced impeachment complaint against
Arroyo. The charge on the complaint stated only
that Arroyo had betrayed the public trust by
calling an elections commissioner. It said nothing
about cheating the people of their sovereign will.
It was considered a poorly constructed complaint
because it used as its only evidence several
newspaper clippings. There was little chance it
would even get past the committee level, which
first determines if the complaint has proper form
and substance. The opposition, not fully realizing
what had happened under its nose, filed a much
stronger and more detailed impeachment complaint
two-and-half weeks later, when Congress opened its
current session. This complaint was considered
well prepared and thorough, and could easily pass
the committee level. Then if the opposition could
have received the required 79 signatures, it would
have gone to the Senate for trial.
But the
opposition was never to get its complaint off the
ground. The House justice committee, controlled by
Arroyo's majority, ruled that since the
constitution stated that only one impeachment
proceeding could be initiated against the
president in a particular year, then the first
complaint, the weakest one filed by Lozano, would
be the one the committee would take up and
consider. The other, stronger complaint, which
would have surely nailed the president in the
Senate, was thrown in the waste basket. In
protest, the opposition staged a walkout. Then
with nobody around to raise objections, the
majority on the justice committee voted to throw
out the weaker Lozano complaint as well, saying it
was "grossly lacking in substance". Arroyo would
not be impeached this year.
And so,
whether the Filipino people would find out if
Arroyo was truly elected fair and square came down
to a definition of the word "proceeding". The
majority claimed that the mere filing of the
papers meant that a "proceeding" had commenced.
The opposition said that filing of papers is just
filing of papers and that the committee was only
debating if a proceeding should take place. They
and several constitutional scholars argued, the
idea with which everyone had agreed, that of
determining with finality Arroyo's innocence or
guilt, was of paramount importance to the country.
The spirit of the law means compromise, which
would lead to the truth.
But then came a
stunning revelation that indicates the lengths to
which Arroyo has gone to make sure the truth does
not have a chance to emerge. A day before the
House voted to throw out the opposition's stronger
impeachment complaint, a former cabinet minister
who resigned back in July claimed she overheard an
extraordinary conversation between the president
and an aide. It was July 8 and the aide told the
president that Lozano had just filed his
complaint. According to the minister, Arroyo then
instructed her aide to find a congressman to
endorse the Lozano complaint. Indeed, moments
after that conversation, a little-known
congressman went to Congress and endorsed the
Lozano complaint. Which even to the casual
observer would seem mighty strange; here is the
president of the republic actually telling an aide
to find a congressman so she could have herself
impeached.
But, of course, Arroyo knew
exactly what she was doing. For back in November,
2000 when she was still vice president, an
impeachment case was filed against her by the same
lawyer, Oliver Lozano. And as with this time, an
ally in Congress then went to endorse it. And same
as this time, the complaint was thrown out because
it was considered useless by the committee.
Through a crafty ploy, Arroyo was inoculated from
the anomaly for a further year, thanks to a
technicality she exploited.
Lozano insists
he does not know Arroyo, saying he doesn't even
support her. Few in the opposition, however, are
buying that line. Regardless, the deed is done.
So while Arroyo can claim victory, those
in the Philippines who simply want to know the
truth behind the serious allegations against her
are convinced it brings the Philippines to a
dangerous precipice where trouble surely awaits.
For without a legitimate venue to help uncover the
truth, street protests, until now fairly mute, are
only bound to grow. Frustration and anger will
surely spread. Then, as Filipinos like to point
out, "anything can happen in the Philippines".
"The virtual death of the complaints in
the committee is not without dire political
consequences to the president," wrote commentator
Amando Doronila in the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
"The quashing of the complaints is an empty
victory for the administration. It merely
demonstrated that the administration has the
capacity to deploy the advantages of incumbency to
save the president from being unseated. Until the
president stands trial where she can defend
herself and where it can be shown that the
accusations are false and do not constitute
impeachable offenses, it would be hard for her to
regain public confidence and reestablish the
legitimacy of her government."
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