LuisTeodoro.com

If President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo’s December 30 announcement of her noncandidacy in 2004 provoked any enthusiasm, it was because of the hope that she would henceforth craft the policies and make the decisions that would address the country’s galaxy of problems unhindered by her political ambitions.

Apparently the belief was widespread that her previous decisions, policies and actions had been primarily colored by her assumed candidacy. Everywhere Mrs. Arroyo goes nowadays she is enthusiastically cheered by a public that had earlier been either indifferent or hostile to her. Her November 2002 plus six approval rating was a result of the equally widespread perception that the conditions of life in this archipelago had become progressively worse under her administration. Today, however, the same public applauds her for saying that she won’t run in 2004, in apparent relief over that decision.
»

President Gloria Macapagal’s announcement that she will not run in 2004 has met, it seems, with universal approval and even admiration.

Both opposition and administration senators, for example, praised the announcement as, in so many words, an act of statesmanship and selfless sacrifice.
»

Apparently to everyone’s–including his most ardent House supporters’–relief, Manila Congressman Mark Jimenez has decided to bow to the inevitable and to present himself to the U.S. Embassy in Manila.

The decision will spare him the embarrassment of being arrested and imprisoned by the Philippine government of which he is a part pending his extradition to the United States. It would also put an end to nearly two years of futile debate and endless charges and counter-charges. »

The decline of the satisfaction ratings of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo is the only possible reason why the already settled question of whether to put former president Joseph Estrada under house arrest or to keep him where he is has once again been raised—and is apparently being seriously entertained in administration circles.

A member of Arroyo’s official family brought the proposal to media attention. Housing Secretary Michael Defensor claims that he initiated a brief discussion of the topic with Estrada when he visited his son Jinggoy at Veterans Memorial Medical Center. Although Defensor and Malacañang deny it, it is likely he was acting as the emissary of Mrs. Arroyo, an issue such as this being far beyond Defensor’s mandate as housing secretary to initiate. He could not have brought it up with Estrada—and alerted the media to it—without the authorization of his boss, the President.
»

Among other unflattering names, Australia’s Prime Minister John Howard has been called a racist and a bigot.

One Australian journalist (Phillip Adams) has described him as “the least comprehending, least compassionate [Australian] prime minister of the modern era.”
»

It doesn’t help the administration case much for its officials to continue blabbering about how it was necessary to keep the Mutual Logistics Support Agreement a secret, despite its being a “boring,” supposedly accounting instrument to facilitate US military aid to the Philippines and US access to “facilities” in the Philippines.

On the other hand, it doesn’t help those opposed to it either to keep on harping on the need for the Agreement to have passed Senate scrutiny first.
»

SENATOR Panfilo “Ping” Lacson announced during a Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (FOCAP) forum yesterday that he would seek the Presidency in 2004, making him the first politician to do so.

Lacson also confirmed the rumor that the opposition is considering two other people for that contest aside from himself. These are Senator Edgardo J. Angara of the Laban ng Demokratikong Pilipino, which as the biggest party in the opposition coalition would be crucial in providing the organizational and manpower muscle needed for a credible campaign; and actor Fernando Poe Jr., who’s still being convinced to run by his best friend and compadre, former President Joseph Estrada.
»