DOJ chief to Cory: Attend to Kris first

Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez advised former President Corazon Aquino yesterday to look after her daughter, actress Kris Aquino, before trying to be a protective mother figure to the country’s fragile democratic institutions.

"She (Cory) should first take care of her daughter. It appears that she is assuming that her voice alone can change this country," Gonzalez said.

In a press conference, the justice secretary noted that Kris, who is also a TV game show host, has figured in a number of controversies in the past.

Kris’ love life has been the stuff of the gossip mills, and her latest flame is a basketball player many years her junior.

Aquino, who came to power in 1986 after a popular revolt ousted the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos, last Friday called on President Arroyo to resign in order to stave off a potentially explosive situation that could compromise the economy as well as our democratic way of life.

Asked if Cory Aquino is included among the people the Department of Justice has been monitoring, Gonzalez said there is no need to do so "because I think Aquino is also busy monitoring her own daughter."

Gonzalez, who was the main private counsel of the former president’s late husband, Sen. Benigno Aquino Jr., in a court martial case during the martial law regime, recalled that he was the one who introduced Cory and Kris to Regal Films matriarch, Lily Monteverde.

"I was in fact the one who introduced her (Kris) to Mother Lily after EDSA I. When we met with Mother Lily, Cory was with Dante Buscayno," he said, at which time Regal was interested in doing a movie on Commander Dante, a former communist leader who, like Ninoy Aquino, had also been sentenced to die by musketry.

Gonzalez also said if he had his way, he would have the impeachment complaint against Arroyo push through in Congress to enable the President to air her side and clear herself of the vote-rigging allegations.

"It will not be good for President Arroyo to block it. I want it to push through… We should not scuttle the impeachment because the people will again say that because of the numbers (of administration congressmen) we are blocking it," he said.

"President Arroyo herself said ‘Let’s go to the legal process,’" he said.

Gonzalez said that Mrs Arroyo’s willingness to defend herself in the impeachment only indicates that "she is not hiding something."