GMA DARED TO ACCOUNT FOR HER ACTIONS
BY NOT CANCELLING MAY 2007 ELECTIONS

Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Q. Pimentel, Jr. (PDP-Laban) today challenged President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to account for her actions during the six years of her presidency instead of plotting with her political allies to scrap the scheduled May, 2007 elections under the guise of pursuing constitutional reforms.

Pimentel said the forthcoming elections will serve as a referendum on the Arroyo presidency and any move to do away with this political exercise will be a travesty of the democratic process.

He warned that the administrations vile attempt to cancel the next congressional and local elections will only fan the embers of public disenchantment and further alienate President Arroyo from the people.

Referring to the reported consensus among administration congressmen to postpone the mid-term elections from May to November, 2007, the minority leader said this only shows that the President and her allies are afraid of being repudiated by the electorate in the face of nationwide surveys consistently showing the opposition is likely to sweep the senatorial race.

Now the hidden agenda of President Arroyo, Speaker Jose de Venecia, Jr. and their self-serving bunch of bootlickers is out. They dont want to submit themselves to the judgment of the people in 2007, as provided by law. They want to hang on to power at all costs even to the extent of frustrating the will of the people for them to submit to electoral accounting by 2007, Pimentel said.

Thats how brazen they are. The people should demand that they respect the rule of law while they still can articulate their concerns.

If the 2007 elections are suspended or discarded to suit the whims and caprices of the administration, Pimentel said this could be the last straw that would break the camels back. He said the people would no longer take this sitting down, considering that President Arroyo had repeatedly turned down calls for a snap presidential election and took advantage of the numerical superiority of her congressional allies to prevent her from facing an impeachment trial.

He branded the Palace-House plan to convene a Constituent Assembly as an exercise in futility in view of the Senates refusal to take part in the charade and the overwhelming objection of the people to the tampering of the Constitution to suit the self-serving gameplan of the administration.

On the part of the Senate opposition, we are one in our desire to block this sordid attempt of the administration to evade their constitutional and legal duty to submit their public positions to the will of the people in 2007, Pimentel said.