'Hyatt 10' warns of state of emergency amid spate of bombings

MANILA, Philippines – Former cabinet secretaries of President Arroyo who resigned en masse four years ago to dramatize their protest against her administration said yesterday she might use the spate of bombings in Mindanao as an excuse to declare a state of emergency.

The 10 former officials, now called Hyatt 10 because they announced their defection at the posh hotel on Roxas Boulevard, said that under a state of emergency, Mrs. Arroyo might call off the elections in 2010 and stay in power indefinitely.

“Let us all join hands, with urgency and resolve, in ensuring that a clean, peaceful, orderly and automated election does take place in May 2010,” they said in a statement.

“To the President and her cohorts, this challenge we throw: don’t push your luck. You have crossed the line too often. With impunity, you have exploited our people’s cynicism and apathy for your own narrow and selfish ends,” they added.

Seven of the 10 former officials met yesterday to mark the fourth anniversary of their resignation with a Mass at the St. Jude church near Malacañang.

The seven were former Education secretary Florencio Abad, Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process Teresita Deles, National Anti-Poverty Commission head Imelda Nicolas, Budget secretary Emilia Boncodin, Social Welfare and Development secretary Corazon Soliman and Agrarian Reform secretary Rene Villa.

After the Mass, the seven marched to the Palace grounds and attempted to deliver their statement to the President but were stopped by the presidential guards.

The statement was titled “GMA’s Crime Against the Nation: From Survival to Perpetuation – At All Cost.”

They said nothing has changed in the Arroyo administration since they walked out four years ago at the height of the “Hello, Garci” controversy as corruption remains rampant in the government.

“The truth remains suppressed and the lying continues. The Garci case was never resolved, executive privilege became a convenient tool to frustrate truth-seekers, even the President’s health condition has become the subject of subterfuge,” they said.

The group said the President has ignored or rejected warnings from international human rights groups and law associations regarding the abuses allegedly committed by security forces against critical journalists and activists.

They also criticized the President for her various foreign trips, which they said could be her way of escaping the “criticisms for the sad and despicable state of the country.”

“The President, the most peripatetic in history, has taken flight with her usual coterie of politicians, family members and hangers-on, wasting precious foreign exchange, while the fiscal deficit threatens to go haywire,” they said.

They claimed that the President has been busy scheming to perpetuate herself in power even if these were illegal or unconstitutional.

These include efforts of her House allies to amend the Constitution even without the participation of the Senate.

In what could be part of her plan to put the country under a state of emergency, Mrs. Arroyo – according to the former officials – is trying to secure the support of the military and police by appointing retired officials to her Cabinet and other offices.

Generals belonging to the Philippine Military Academy class of 1978 supposedly benefited from accelerated promotions at the expense of their upper classmen. Mrs. Arroyo is an “adopted” member of PMA Class ’78.