Don’t listen to FVR, Bro. Mike, GMA urged

President Arroyo was urged yesterday not to listen to the "man with the cigar" and El Shaddai leader Mike Velarde who are proposing that she cut her term of office or share power with the opposition.

"I think GMA should not listen to FVR (former President Fidel Valdez Ramos), the main proponent of abbreviating her term of office. His role in saving her skin is a bit exaggerated. She has no debts to repay him," said Palawan Rep. Abraham Mitra, an Arroyo ally.

He said the President should reject a proposal for her to share power with the opposition, a suggestion that also calls for her to cut short her term.

"Bringing in a hodgepodge of clashing personalities in her Cabinet would lead to a collision, not a coalition government," he said.

Mitra stressed that if Mrs. Arroyo survives the political crisis she is facing, including the impeachment complaints pending against her in the House, she could still finish presidency in 2010.

"Stay the course, Madam President, and stay away from the man with the cigar," he added, referring to Ramos.

It was former President Ramos who had first proposed that Mrs. Arroyo offer to cut short her term as a concession to the Cha-cha (Charter change) initiative and as a way to exit gracefully in the midst of an ongoing political crisis.

Two weeks ago, the former leader criticized the President for allegedly burying the Cha-cha issue and giving more attention to less important matters.

As for Velarde, he is also supporting Cha-cha and a power-sharing arrangement with the opposition as a way for Mrs. Arroyo to resolve the crisis.

Mitra is one of several Arroyo loyalists in the Liberal Party, which has taken a stand calling for the resignation of the President and for her removal from office through the impeachment process if she refuses to step down.

The impeachment complaints against her — amounting to three — are now being studied by the House committee on justice, since not enough House members signed the original impeachment petition.

For his part, Makati Rep. Agapito Aquino said the proposal of Mrs. Arroyo’s staunch supporters for power-sharing means that "she is desperately clinging to her post."

Aquino, who is allied with opposition Sen. Panfilo Lacson, said the President is doing all she can "not to do her job but to keep it."

Minority Leader Francis Escudero, the leader of the opposition in the House, said the statement of Environment Secretary Mike Defensor, one of the President’s spokesmen, that Mrs. Arroyo is willing to cut short her term shows "her trademark insincerity and her propensity for double-talk."

"She is now floating that idea to appease those who want to support the constitutional process of removing her from office," he said.

Escudero noted that in a recent television interview, Mrs. Arroyo, in responding to questions, "grudgingly admitted that she wants to serve out her term."

"That was only a day after she told the media that she would leave the matter about her finishing her presidency to those who will propose constitutional amendments," he said.

Like Aquino, Rep. Teodoro Casiño of the military party-list group Bayan Muna said he believes the power-sharing idea is a "malevolently desperate political ploy" by Mrs. Arroyo.

"The President wishes to get away from the political crisis and is willing to trade off some of her hold in Malacañang as long as she stays in office," he said.