Past events show GMA's call for truce Machiavelian

The very moment I hit my computer keyboard for this article, The Freeman's headline stared at me. Really, it disarmed me. I grabbed the paper and ran to my lady who was then playing an old Steve Lawrence record and exclaimed, "Her Excellency President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo is calling for a truce!" Good heavens, the news was some kind of a miracle. I would be totally dishonest to you should I refuse to acknowledge that my initial feeling was one of unadulterated relief.

"Great leaders", I told my lady, "have the uncanny sense of brinkmanship" because then, I thought the president was just that - a great leader. My spirit was buoyed all the more when I, acting like the trumpeter of old, read aloud that part of the news quoting the president saying, "the longer our political turmoil lasts, the deeper the hurt inflicted upon the public." How true! I imagined that I would tug Carmen's heart, she being a past city councilor.

Then, I noticed something inexplicable. She gave me a quizzical look. Thinking my appearance was awful, I wanted to go to the mirror but before I could move, she stopped me. No, it was not the way I looked. It was the news. The story, despite its being sourced from the president herself, did not inspire belief. Slowly and quite sadly, I realized that the president's credibility had been so sullied that it would be difficult to accept even her most laudable policy. Nobody, but her past questionable pronouncements placed her in such a horrible situation of being unbelievable.

Take, for instance, her announcement last December 30, 2002 that she would not run for president. She surprised everyone with her personal disavowal from joining the 2004 elections. Her declaration appeared honest. Not very few people believed her. Someone described it the ultimate of statesmanship. As it eventually came about, the president's announcement was a ploy. For those of you who have read Sun Tzu's Art of War, Pres. Arroyo's declaration was designed to confuse the enemy, so to speak. Many of the political parties whose plans were designed against her candidacy got skewered in their organizational work. There was no denying that when she made a complete turn around and launched her candidacy, she enjoyed the element of surprise at the expense of honor.

Let us look at the more recent events. The president was deathly silent weeks after the Hello Garci tapes surfaced. We surmised why. She was, in all likelihood, contemplating escape. But, the truth that it was she on one end of the telephone line could not be suppressed. Only when she probably felt she could not deny her voice, did she face the nation. Yet, what did she do? Apart from confessing to a "lapse of judgment", she did not do anything positive to atone for her sin. Worse, as the shouts for her resignation mounted, she mocked the peoples' search of truth with such wild cards as the truth commission and charter change. Of course, as consuelo de bobo, she spoke of a constitutional process, which the whole electorate wanted to mean impeachment.

Yet, the constitutional process continues to be torpedoed. We have been witnesses to what the president's party mates do. There is a massive and sickening attempt to block the impeachment complaint from being endorsed to the Senate, the constitutional intent of a speedy process notwithstanding. I note that the House of Representatives, no thanks to tyranny of their number, has unduly complicated a simple issue. To my mind, the real objective of this delaying tactic is to give time to the movers of Malacañang to reach the kind of congressmen in the mold of Rep. Amang Magsaysay. Examine their hair splitting on whether or not there are three impeachment complaints. While they are supposed to be looking into the requirement of form and substance, they actually stretch the days of debate, hoping that the men belonging to the majority find their gullible congressional preys.