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Friday, July 15, 2005
Zubiri insists Aquino has no moral ascendancy
By Lizanilla J. Amarga
BUKIDNON -- Governor Jose Maria Zubiri slammed former President Corazon Aquino for calling for the ouster of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo saying that the former chief executive is only trying to protect her family and cronies' interests.
He also questioned Aquino's moral ascendancy over Arroyo and her preaching about how the President must resign and make the supreme sacrifice when several workers were killed in her own Hacienda Luisita.
"She (Aquino) seemed to have forgotten the historical fact that her presidency was besieged by nine coup attempts which almost ousted her from power but she did not resign then and now she is saying these things to President Arroyo!" he told media practitioners here.
Zuburi said Aquino is making such resignation calls only to protect her and her cronies' interests and not actually the Filipino people.
He said Aquino, like many other people in Manila, seems to point it out that only they have the "monopoly of loving the Filipino people."
Zubiri even cited how Aquino fooled the people in several supposedly "pro-poor" governmental reforms such as the Agrarian Reform Program. "But it was only for the furtherance of their interests," he said in the dialect.
Advocates for Peace and Development in Mindanao chairman Amer Manaya echoed Zubiri's views on Aquino, saying it was just fortunate for Aquino that the nation was "kind" to her.
"She (Aquino) lost her husband to an assassin. She was spared the criticism of being incompetent. But she was guilty of the sins of omission as well as the sins of commission," he said.
"Her (Aquino) reign brought profligacy in the government bureaucracy. While the dictatorship was fraught with extravagance many government agencies were using Vietnam surplus vehicles. When the Aquino regime assumed the helm of government Pajeros became a common place in the bureaucracy," he added.
Self-interest
Because nothing came from Aquino's presidency, Manaya said the Filipino people have to "groped" to find what was it that made her reign better than that of Marcos.
"I said grope because we literally were in the dark due to brownouts and we don't know where she was steering our government to," he said.
This group leader said Aquino's self-interest was evident in how she spoke on a nationwide telecast asking Arroyo to resign for a good of the country after she, with Bishop Villegas in tow, went to Malacañang to speak to the President.
Not content with her first appearance, he said Aquino surfaced anew at the DLSU where, again, she asked Arroyo to resign.
"As far as Cory is concerned, GMA has not addressed the problem of the poor. Then she proceeded by saying that she supports an NGO that comes to the aid of small entrepreneurs," he said.
"I was waiting for her to say that the Cojuangco family is relinquishing their vast Hacienda Luisita to their tenants. She could have made the difference. She could have a moral ascendancy over GMA," he added.
For Manaya's group, Aquino has not even paused a bit to think of how Hacienda Luisita was creatively excluded from the comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program of her time.
"Did she asked forgiveness to this brazen act of saving the family hacienda from the government program of Agrarian Reform? Not too long ago, the oppressed tenants in the hacienda revived their plea to have a piece of land they have long tilled," he said. "They were met with gunfire and not a few died because they pressed their luck too far. Was there remorse? Was there an act of corruption?"
(July 15, 2005 issue)
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