A Look Back at Arroyo’s Many Sins and Why She Should Pay

Source: Bulatlat.com

MANILA — After nine years in power, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has left the Malacanang palace. She is no longer cloaked with presidential immunity, which she and her allies had used to shield her from corruption charges, human-rights violations and other alleged crimes against the Filipino people.

Up to her last weeks in office, impunity presented itself. For two consecutive days, journalists Jesiderio Camangyan, radio anchor of Sunrise FM in Davao Oriental, and Joselito Agustin of dzJC Aksyon Radyo in Laoag City, were shot dead. After the elections, human-rights worker Benjamin Bayles of Negros Occidental, union member Edward Panganiban of Laguna and Bayan Muna member Jim Gales of Davao were murdered in separate incidents.

In the past nine years, journalists and activists have become easy targets for assassination. According to the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP), 104 journalists have been murdered under the Arroyo regime. Human-rights group Karapatan recorded 1,190 victims of extrajudicial killings under the Arroyo regime, from January 2001 to March 2010.

There had been 205 victims of enforced disappearances, 1,028 victims of torture, and hundreds of thousands were forcibly displaced in rural areas as a result of military operations.

These killings and other atrocities continue despite international condemnation and local protests. In fact, just this month, a five-member delegation of the Ecumenical Voice for Human Rights and Peace in the Philippines had gone to Geneva and made oral interventions at the 14th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council. They told the world that Arroyo’s counterinsurgency program has been the bloodiest and most vicious since martial law years.

Arroyo, as commander in chief of the armed forces, clearly condoned the killings. The absence of culpability of the known masterminds and the rewards given to the worst violators had emboldened the perpetrators even more to commit abuses.

Such impunity led to one of the greatest tragedies under the Arroyo regime, the Ampatuan massacre.

Closely allied with the Arroyos, the Ampatuans thought they could get away with the murder of 57 individuals, including 31 journalists. Already, the cases filed against the warlords of Maguindanao are at risk of going down the drain.

Impunity also persists in corruption and other scandals.

Arroyo and her husband Jose Miguel “Mike” Arroyo have also pocketed billions in various anomalous deals in the past nine years.

Deals/Projects	Pocketed Amount
Fertilizer Scam (2004)	P728 million
Diosdado Macapagal Blvd.	P600 million
Mega Pacific Deal (2004)	P500 million
Cash handouts to congressmen and governors (2007)	P160 million
Euro Generals (2008)	P6.9 million
Total	P2,038,600,000.00

Deals/Projects	Pocketed Amount
Piatco Deal (2003)	USD 20 million
US Real Properties (2003)	USD 7.1 million
Northrail Project (2004)	USD 50 million
Kuleksyon sa Jueteng (2005)	USD 10 million
NBN-ZTE Deal (2007)	USD 32.9 million
IMPSA Deal (2009)	USD 2 million
World Bank Road Projects (2009)	USD 33 million
Total	USD 145,900,000 million

Data from Bagong Alyansang Makabayan

Using money, Arroyo was able to suppress seven impeachment cases filed against her. Using deception and repression, she was able to quell public outrage against her regime.

Following the expose on the “Hello Garci” election fraud scandal, Arroyo issued Proclamation 1017 and arrested leaders of the opposition, including the late Anakpawis congressman and labor leader Crispin Beltran. She also issued what was called a calibrated preemptive response (CPR) to break up mass protests.

To cover up for the cases of corruption and other scandals, Arroyo signed Executive Order 464 barring government officials from testifying before public inquiries without her approval.

Just recently, the Ombudsman, a close friend of the First Gentleman and a known ally of the president, absolved Arroyo and her husband from the aborted multimillion national broadband network deal with the Chinese telecom company ZTE.

Doubled Wealth

Arroyo’s declared wealth more than doubled in the past nine years. In 2001, when Arroyo took power, her total wealth was about P67 million. As of July 2009, according to her declared statement of assets and liabilities, her wealth has reached P144 million.

The “Jose Pidal” account that was exposed in 2003 had P321 million and the Arroyos’ real-estate properties in the United States totaled $7.1 million. The profligacy of the Arroyos, highlighted by that $20,000-dinner at Le Cirque in New York in August 2009, has enraged the poor and the hungry.

For how could she stomach the expensive dinner when back home, hunger has reached record numbers, with almost one in four Filipino households going hungry? In a 2009 report by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), the Philippines ranked 34th on a scale of zero to 100 among 84 countries in the Global Hunger Index (GHI).

The Arroyo government has had the lowest allocation for social services.

	Educaton *	Health *	Housing *
Arroyo	15.1 percent	1.8 percent	0.4 percent
Estrada	18.7 percent	2.4 percent	0.8 percent
Ramos	15.5 percent	2.6 percent	0.6 percent
Aquino	12.3 percent	3.1 percent	0.1 percent

*total allocatin in the national budget, IBON Foundation

In 2010, the Arroyo administration was only spending P7 per Filipino per day on education, P1 on health and 16 centavos on housing – while paying the equivalent of P22 on debt service.

A self-proclaimed economist, Arroyo failed to improve the lives of the Filipino people.

Economic Strategy

The Arroyo government’s economic strategy built on free-market policies has removed trade barriers, has given full control of investments to foreign investors, privatized public utilities and social services deregulation and debt payments.

Under the Arroyo administration, workers have had pittance wage increases.

President	Wage Increase
Arroyo	P27
Estrada	P22
Ramos	P16
Aquino	P82

IBON Foundation

In 2009, the minimum wage was between P345 and P382. A family of six needs nearly P1,000 to live on every day.

The prices of basic commodities become too expensive.

As of July 2009

Basic Commodities/Utilities	Price in 2001	Price in 2009
LPG (per 11 kg tank)	P192	P440 (July 2009)
Diesel (per liter)	P12.62	P33.29 (July 2009)
Rice (regular milled per kilo)	P17.51	P30 (July 2009)
Electricity (per KWH, Meralco)	P5.13	P8.80 (May 2009)
Water (basic, per cubic meter)	Manila Water – P2.95 Maynilad – P6.58	Manila Water – P19.64 Maynilad – P23.05 (4th quarter 2008)

Data from Bagong Alyansang Makabayan

The Arroyo regime also had the longest period of high unemployment rate, the highest in Philippine history. In January 2010, there were 11.4 million jobless and underemployed Filipinos. It is not surprising, therefore, that more Filipinos were forced to find jobs abroad, with 3,898 leaving the country every day. The exodus of Filipino laborers, including skilled workers and professionals, is a manifestation of an ailing economy.

Instead of implementing genuine agrarian reform and nationalist industrialization to beef up the local economy, the Arroyo government extended the bogus Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP), neglected the farmers and favored the foreign corporations and big business at the expense of small and medium Filipino entrepreneurs.

Clearly, Arroyo should be made accountable for all these atrocities inflicted on the Filipino people. (By Ronalyn V. Olea with reports from Anne Marxze Umil/bulatlat.com)