GMA doing well after upset stomach

MANILA, Philippines – After being sidelined for several days due to a reported upset stomach, President Arroyo has apparently resumed her normal schedule with a trip back to her home province.

Interviewed over state-run dzRB, deputy presidential spokesman Anthony Golez said the President is “well and healthy today” after suffering from what Malacañang officials said was an upset stomach.

Golez said he was able to talk to the President yesterday morning and was told that she was attending a fiesta somewhere in Pampanga.

“She is attending a
fiesta in Pampanga to celebrate with some of the communities there. She is well and healthy today,” Golez said in Filipino.

The usually hectic schedule of the President was conspicuously light this week and she was mostly seen only at appointments inside the Palace grounds, including the Cabinet meeting last Tuesday.

During the arrival honors for visiting Kuwaiti Prime Minister Sheikh Nasser Al-Mohammad Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah last Friday, it was Vice President Noli de Castro who took the place of the President during the ceremony.

Reporters noticed that the President’s personal physician, Dr. Juliet Gopez-Cervantes, was at the Palace grounds, prompting speculation that Mrs. Arroyo was ill.

The President was seen later in the evening at the signing ceremony for three agreements aimed at enhancing trade and bilateral relations between the Philippines and Kuwait.

Golez, a doctor, said that what the President experienced was something that every person normally experiences, just like flu and fever.