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Tuesday, June 07, 2005
Arroyo official presents 'doctored' tape
MANILA -- Malacañang said it has two tapes, one the original and the other "doctored", of a series of taped conversations between a certain "Gary" and President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo.
Arroyo's spokesman Ignacio Bunye said the "doctored" tape was the one the opposition will present to support allegations of cheating against the President and a Commission on Elections (Comelec) commissioner in the May 2004 elections.
Bunye refused to identify the person who gave them the recordings.
He played the two tapes for reporters covering Malacañang and later said someone was tapping the cellular phone of President Arroyo, who has changed phones several times because of this.
"While we cannot at this time confirm the authenticity of either version, we can today (Monday) confirm by virtue of these findings another opposition plot to destabilize the administration of President Arroyo. This latest plot, by far the most devious and desperate, involves the illegal bugging of a conversation and the subsequent electronic doctoring, alteration and revision of that so as to introduce elements that were not really there," he said.
He said the plot will not succeed nor will it derail Arroyo's political and economic agenda. He added that the plotters would be brought to justice.
He said "Gary" is not Comelec Commissioner Virgilio Garcillano and that Malacañang will present "Gary" "in due time." He said he will submit the tapes to the NBI for investigation.
Senate President Franklin Drilon said the leaders of the Liberal Party (LP) went to Malacañang Monday noon to have lunch with the President and expressed their support for her. He said the decision was reached last weekend.
Arroyo said in a press conference "there are segments of the opposition that want to undermine my ability to govern and even want to overthrow me and I will not let them, I will concentrate on my governance and I thank the Liberal Party for their support both for my governance and the stability of our democratic form of life."
She said she is confident in the loyalty of the military, Armed Forces Chief
Efren Abu, and "in the cool heads of our citizens to maintain and protect the democracy that they have worked so hard to defend."
Each set of conversations contains three conversations between "Gary" and First Gentleman Mike Arroyo and 11 between "Gary" and President Arroyo.
What Bunye claimed as the original tape had Gary's voice very clear and sounding youthful compared to the allegedly doctored one, where either the voice of President or her husband was garbled. The second tape, allegedly doctored, had Gary's voice garbled and sounding a bit older.
There were also discrepancies in some of the dialogues between the original and the spliced versions.
A transcript of what appeared to be the spliced version was faxed to reporters.
In the Senate, Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr. said the Palace has provided the smoke gun showing the massive electoral fraud that occurred during the presidential elections of May 2004.
Pimentel, in a privilege speech, criticized Press Secretary Ignacio Bunye for making unfair accusations that the opposition would release a tape as part of an attempt to destabilize the administration of President Arroyo.
According to Pimentel, the tape contains a telephone conversation between President Arroyo and Comelec Commissioner Virgilio Garcillano concerning the canvassing of votes.
He asked Bunye to shed light on the conversation since he's the one who brought the matter up for public discussion.
"The ball is in his hands. He may dribble it to kill time if he wants. Or he may toss it back to the opposition with the clarifications sought so that the dialogue could continue in terms more understandable to our people," Pimentel said.
The conversation took place on May 17, 2004 and showing President Arroyo allegedly asking Garcillano to get copies of the National Movement for Free Elections' municipal certificates of canvass.
Garcillano said in that conversation he will get advance copies of the
Namfrel quick count because the group is sympathetic to her. (JPM/Sunnex Luzon)
(June 7, 2005 issue)
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