CEBU, Philippines – “Strictly no politics please.” This was the instruction of President Gloria Arroyo during the interview granted to GMA-7 news Anchor Bobby Nalzaro during her trip to Cebu yesterday.
The president avoided prepared and screened questions of Nalzaro which dealt with the speculations that next year’s elections will not push through and poll automation.
Only four out of the seven screened questions were answered by Arroyo because of time constraint.
Nalzaro also said that there are two local questions which were scratched out by the Presidential Management Staff.
One was whether she would mediate in the escalating feud between her allies Cebu Provincial Governor Gwendolyn Garcia and Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña.
The other asked for a glimpse of what the public can expect from “Citizen Gloria” after she steps down as President next year.
Nalzaro said he solicited questions from The Freeman editor in chief Jeremias Tundag and Sunstar Daily's editor in chief Pachico Seares.
Arroyo appeared eager to answer Nalzaro's first question about the legacy she was going to leave to the Filipinos as the longest serving President of the Republic of the Philippines next to President Ferdinand Marcos.
“I want to be remembered as one who worked so hard to instill permanent change and bring benefit to everybody by providing a stronger economy,” she said.
Arroyo said before there were millions worth of investment which are now transformed into billions in terms of physical and human infrastructure.
She said she will make sure that the country will be prepared for the next generation.
The human infrastructure, she said is very important to ensure support of workers in today's challenging times.
“Let us put faces on workers who had availed from our jobs fair and retrainings, we have here several hotel employees, let us ask them,” Arroyo said.
Arroyo then acted as host as she interviewed hotel employees who were hired at the Imperial Palace Waterpark Resort and Spa through a job fair and one from training at the Technical Education Skills Development Authority. Some of them were from Zamboanga and Leyte.
“People are coming here to Cebu from other provinces as the number one tourist destination, but also for jobs not related to tourism, this was undertaken by DOT Secretary Joseph Ace Durano,” Arroyo said.
Durano announced that the 6,000 workers who were jobless due to the global economic crisis were now mostly rehired.
“We wanted to accelerate the recovery so that they could get jobs back faster than the others,” she said
The interview almost did not realize when Arroyo appeared to be in a foul mood immediately upon her arrival at the hotel.
According to some of the Malacañang personnel, Arroyo was disappointed because some of her Cabinet members were late. – Ferliza C. Contratista/BRP (THE FREEMAN)