Arroyo: Don’t be offended by ‘communist’ tag

GUAGUA, Pampanga — "I don’t know why they get mad whenever I call them ‘communists.’"

Thus said President Arroyo who told her critics belonging to left-leaning groups not to be offended when she refers to them as such, explaining that the term is "neutral."

The President gave the explanation during a surprise lunch with local government and military officials as well as local journalists at the Plate and Platter restaurant here yesterday after she cast her vote in the belated barangay election in San Nicolas, Lubao town.

"After all, communism is not against the law. We are just being accurate," she said over plates of native dishes, including fried quail.

"They should not consider the term pejorative. It’s just a neutral term, although it connotes ideologies," she added.

The President cast her vote at Precinct 1-A at the San Nicolas East Elementary School where she was number 83 in the list of voters. The voter’s list placed her address as De Guzman st., Purok 3, San Nicolas, Lubao.

The Commission on Elections reset barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections in San Nicolas and several other villages in Pampanga and elsewhere in Central Luzon after week-long monsoon rains heavily inundated these places.

Floodwaters in Mrs. Arroyo’s old voting precinct at the school’s main building used to be knee-high. The school’s frontyard remains flooded.

Despite the muddy grounds in most parts of the elementary school, the President wore black high-heeled shoes..

In front of her voting precinct was a three-foot bust of her late father, former President Diosdado Macapagal.

After the President cast her vote, she asked her driver to stop along the Gapan-San Fernando-Olongapo (GSO) Highway in this town. She alighted from her van to buy lanzones and rambutan from a fruit vendor.

She then proceeded to the Plate and Platter restaurant, with instructions to the Presidential Security Group to invite local journalists to join her for lunch.