It’s now completely obvious how hungry Noli is to be President

Last night’s TV Patrol interview on, where else, ABS-CBN, leaves no doubt that Vice-President Noli de Castro is hungering to become President. Trying to sound "presidential", but managing to look merely disloyal and super-ambitious, Noli kept on hammering away at the theme that under the Constitution (ang ating Saligang Batas), if President GMA can no longer perform as President, he (holy Noli, anointed by the nation) is ready to become President and very capable of assuming the Presidency.

He expressed no personal support for his President and former running mate, the besieged La Presidenta, confining himself to saying that like every Cabinet member he supported the President’s "programs". In short: Bye, bye, Gloria, I’m ready to take over.

TV Patrol’s Ted Failon played the "straight man" as they say in comedy shows, feeding Noli the right questions, each of them provoking an apparently prepared answer. One of Failon’s queries was about whether it was time for the Veep to "stand up" et cetera.

I watched last night’s show in utter fascination. De Castro the previous day had already announced to one newspaper that he was "prepared to assume the presidency if President Macapagal-Arroyo resigned or was impeached". He even added in that newspaper interview that "she did not say she cheated". (That was almost supportive). The next sentence, however, floored me. Here’s how it went: "He (Noli) said he had forgiven the President and was still willing to serve her and implement her social reform program."

Susmariosep, I guess La Gloria’s been abandoned by her Vice-President who gave her the "most unkindest cut of all" by declaring he "forgives" her. Forgive her for what? For telling that Comelec official to "cheat" or for her "lapse in judgement"?

Wouldn’t it be a natural instinct for many to suspect that if the Commission on Elections cheated for GMA, why not for her Vice-Presidential partner? How big, in retrospect, was the gap between De Castro and Loren Legarda?

Of course, if GMA resigns, or gets evicted by impeachment, De Castro is the next in line. But don’t you think it’s obscene for the Veep – who’s one heartbeat away from the Presidency – to appear so brazenly eager to take over? I’m sorry to say that, from his TV appearance, we already have a foretaste of his arrogance.

Indeed, Noli may become President. That’s up to the lords of Karma. But there’s nothing in life that is a sure thing.

Is our strategic partner, my old outfit, ANC-ABS-CBN plugging for Noli, their Magandang Gabi Bayan, to become President – by getting La Gloria ejected? That’s a question I cannot answer, but you can arrive at your own conclusion by watching television, and listening to radio.

To all who fancy themselves as kingmakers, though, history should provide a caveat – a word of caution. Once a man or woman becomes President, the imperious – probably better-termed "imperial" – attitude surfaces. He won’t meekly take dictation. On the contrary, he’ll resent it. After all, the king is boss and answerable only to himself.

The Chinese, with 7,000 years of history, know this very well. Whenever a man defeated all rivals (and put them to the sword, or executed them), his next move would be to arrest and execute his own generals and any possible future claimants to the throne.

I’m talking about China, of course. What about the Philippines?

* * *

I don’t know whether President GMA is beginning to realize what a blunder it was for her to have made that radio-television quasi-confession – admitting she had "spoken" to a Comelec official (which she did not name), apologizing, saying she is "sorry" and asking the nation to "forgive" her for that "lapse in judgement".

Far from defusing an already muddled situation, it opened a Pandora’s Box of troubles for her.

FPJ’s widow, Susan Roces, who corrected one reporter by underscoring she is "Mrs. Poe" turned from previous calm to the angry and militant persona of avenging widow. GMA’s radio-TV statement may have been, for her, the final proof that her husband had been cheated of victory in the May 2004 Presidential poll. Mrs. Poe’s furious face was all over television, in print media, and all over the international press.

Here’s how the globe-girdling International Herald Tribune (owned 100 percent by The New York Times, and therefore, probably carried by the NYT, too) put it in the pasa to its front page top story. Said the Tribune: "Poe’s widow, Susan Roces, urged Arroyo to resign."

" ‘I cannot accept your apology,’ Roces said, referring to Arroyo’s nationally televised address Monday, in which the president apologized for talking to an election official while the votes were still being counted."

"‘You destroyed the trust of your countrymen,’ Roces said. ‘You don’t have the right to lead the country."

The IHT went on to publish: "Roces called Arroyo ‘arrogant’ and said the ‘gravest thing’ the president did was to allegedly steal the presidency ‘not once, but twice,’ referring to the 2001 revolt that ousted Joseph Estrada, then the president, and put Arroyo, then vice-president, into power."

Them’s strong words – and they are playing abroad. Her fit of anger didn’t do Susan (Mrs. Poe) much good either, but it certainly damaged GMA.

* * *

The Financial Times of London, printed simultaneously in Europe, the US, and Asia, also ran the chronicle of GMA’s woes at one of its top front page stories, with an immense photograph in color (in the Asian edition) of the First Gent kissing GMA under the headline: "Macapagal’s Husband Relents: Juan Miguel to Go."

Go where, and for how long, the President didn’t say.

In any event, the rest of the article occupied seven columns on top of Page 2, again with a photograph of an angry Susan (Mrs. Poe) raising two fingers, and the caption underneath stating: "Susan Roces, the widow of a former presidential candidate, demanded Mrs. Macapagal’s resignation, saying her admission proved she had cheated during elections."

The FT piece by Roel Landingin quoted Susan Roces in full, as well.

"The gravest thing you have done is to have stolen the presidency not once but twice," said Mrs. Roces, recalling Mrs. Macapagal’s rise to power in January 2001 and the hotly contested May 2004 polls."

Let me tell it as I see it as an old political observer who’s covered eight Presidents. Susan didn’t look pretty in her rage, but it made matters far worse for the President when her Secretary of Justice Raul Gonzalez started making sarcastic remarks about Ms. Susan, calling her a "griping widow" and sneering that it’s "very clear that her husband was not destined to be president and died of natural causes."

Sanamagan. You don’t say such things of a lady, most of all a widow. Raul, sad to say, deep-sixed any feelings of sympathy for GMA as a result of Swanie’s terrifying outburst. When will the rabid defenders of La Glorietta learn to keep their traps shut – or their partisanship less evident. (Ditto for Gen. Reynaldo G. Wycoco, Director of the NBI).

You can be sure that ANC-ABS-CBN (which was once condemned by Susan, if you’ll recall) merrily kept on replaying Secretary Gonzalez’s sneering remarks – and you know why. On cue, GMA flew south to Iloilo where she was greeted by Gonzalez and supporters, and where the Iloilo Governor pledged her that Visayan province’s undying support.

Cebu, naturally, is another bastion of GMA’s – although its leading politicians are trying to break up Cebu into four provinces. Salamabit. Whatta country. Are we breaking up?

The President’s Polo Club appearance to try to reassure a crowd of mostly foreign businessmen as well as a number of Filipino business leaders that things would calm down and she would "survive the scandal that has been bedeviling her administration for the past three weeks" (I quote the front page of the International Herald Tribune) didn’t seem successful. I wasn’t there but talked to several who had been present.

The foreign businessmen and "investors" didn’t know how to react when La Presidenta announced that her husband, the First Gent Mike Arroyo, was voluntarily going into exile. (Sus, he’s now being subpoenaed by the Sandiganbayan). Were they supposed to clap – or to groan? What a dilemma. So they just tried to keep poker faced and silent. Nothing ventured, though, about Mikey and Iggy.

In any event, here’s how the IHT’s leading article by Carlos H. Conde on page one put it. Headline: "ARROYO SENDS HER HUSBAND INTO EXILE." Subhead: "Philippine President Tries to Quiet Critics, But Outcry Grows."

Conde commented in the second paragraph that "Arroyo’s announcement which she called a ‘sacrifice’ was upstaged by increasing calls for her resignation."

The article, aside from Susan’s condemnation, added that "Oscar Cruz, a Catholic bishop who implicated Arroyo’s husband, Jose Miguel Arroyo, in an illegal gambling racket called jueteng, also asked Arroyo to step down."

"The president’s husband, their son Juan Miguel, and her brother-in-law, Ignacio Arroyo, have been accused of receiving payoffs from gambling lords."

That’s how mordantly the IHT played it.

In sum, doesn’t it look like GMA is taking a beating from the foreign press – or, at least, from its more aggressive sectors? The Financial Times headline was no kinder: "Macapagal’s husband bows to pressure."

In her speech, GMA was quoted by the FT as asserting with regard to her husband: "My family will miss him terribly, and I ask you to help pray that we remain strong as a family."

Alas, businessmen are not the prayerful or sentimental sort. The bottom line for money men, of whatever stripe or persuasion, of whatever color or creed, is profit, return on investment, and the assurance that when a deal is made, "a deal is a deal." They may politely attempt to put on a sympathetic face, but they have no sympathy for an emotional President.

At the risk of sounding disrespectful and preachy, may I say that this is the time for a President to demonstrate guts, grit, and chutzpah. This is a time of testing, not for wailing. After all, did not the President once resolutely declare: "I am married to the country"?

When all is said and done, if she is to surmount her troubles, GMA must be firm. And she must do things, not speechify. She must crush jueteng, to begin with.

It’s increasingly clear that her . . . uh, confession was a mistake. Confession may be good for the soul. It is the kiss of death in politics.

An incomplete confession is even worse. It sounds insincere and phoney while giving enemies and critics the opportunity to attack more fiercely. For every "admission" creates a crack, which can be pried wider to demolish the defense.

Erap, naturally, is going for the jugular. Yes, he cries out, he was cheated of the Presidency and it was GMA who stole it from him!

Makati Mayor Jojo Binay is trying to mobilize a big demonstration, giving the game away by admonishing the Makati employees taking part to first take off their uniforms. Will mass rallies be generated despite the rains?

Abangan.

As for poor, unfortunate Department of Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap, he has quit the Cabinet on television. Yap was one of the most clean-cut in a Cabinet of individuals of dubious character, but he and his family were singled out for "tax evasion". He was afterwards praised in unctuous terms by those who were sharpening their axes for him. Yap was too courteous in his statement of resignation, but he’s better off. He resigned before they "fired" him.

There must be something wrong with becoming Agriculture Secretary. It doesn’t make for a long and happy Cabinet life. Remember what happened to Cito Lorenzo, Jr.?

I wish we had some good news for a change. But, at the moment, behind every dark cloud seems to be . . . another dark cloud.