Here comes Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. The daughter of the 'Poor Boy from Lubao', she had inherited from her father the political prowess to bring her to the top. From being an economics professor in Ateneo and UP, and being a classmate of Bill Clinton in Georgetown, she entered government as Secretary of Trade and Industry. Later on, she became senator, then vice president. When Erap was ousted, she became President-continuing Erap's term until 2004 and subsequently until 2010, when her term ended after 'winning' the 2004 presidential elections.
In her nine years or so in office, many things had improved. Sources say that during her time, the Philippine economy grew at an average of 3% a year. Not bad. Of course, what do we expect from an economist that graduated abroad? During her time, there were some other things that improved, but I don't really remember because they are not significant.
The significant events in her nine years in office was when she was embroiled in many controversies. I will just name a few from my memory, of course, these things had really caught my attention, and thus significant. One was the 2004 electoral fraud where she had 'conclusively won' over FPJ. The peculiar point here was, how did FPJ become annihilated on ARMM? Being a man close to the masses, one could never imagine why FPJ got 0 votes from the people from ARMM. Even without conclusive evidence, this matinee idol cannot lose in this region; it is just too hard to believe that nobody even voted for their idol, especially that these region contained lots of his loyal supporters. This is really something peculiar. In relation to this issue, she became embroiled in a controversy in which she called a particular election commissioner named Garcillano. I even had a ring tone of that very funny and nasty phone conversation in which she told the commissioner to rig the ballots in her favor. She later apologized in a much-publicized TV appearance. If justice was just upheld, she must have been caught at that very moment.
Another was the NBN-ZTE broadband deal. The Arroyos had reportedly talked things with the Chinese businessmen in underhanded business deals that could give the Arroyos quite some money. This is corruption at its finest, but I don't really know why nobody was prosecuted at that case despite the evidence being very powerful. I don't even known where the case went.
Going on, we have the ever-perennial imprisonment and murder of activists and critics of the government. Back in her days, I had a friend who lost his parents to these extrajudicial killings. Many other activists were jailed; some yet are detained even without legal basis. Some had vanished and never came back again. Of these cases, not one had been solved as of the moment.
But the peak of these is the Maguindanao massacre where more than 50 journalists were killed and one was reported missing, perpetrated by allies of the Arroyo government. This is the world's most inglorious attack against journalists; imagine, 58 people murdered at an instant, majority of which are journalists and mediamen who worked as vanguards of the people's interests of learning about the news and happenings around them.
There are still many others, much much many, too many that I even forgot about it already. We have the chopper anomalies, many others. And now, a sick and ailing Congressman Gloria Macapagal Arroyo is asking the government to travel abroad for whatever reason (whether to escape her crimes or to have her sicknesses treated, I don't really know). The Department of Justice had issued a travel ban prohibiting Arroyo and co. to leave the country. Her party says that the travel ban is unjust as it is her constitutional right to travel and seek medical treatment. The Supreme Court sided with her (after the justices appointed by Arroyo voted against the travel ban), and the travel ban was lifted.
This had caused a ruckus in the government. The justice branch is fighting with the executive branch of the government for legal supremacy. I may not be a Political Science student, nor a lawyer to explain things, but I just want to say out loud my interpretations on the matter and how it should finish, again, from my own (call it biased) perspective.
Congresswoman Arroyo and co. here is asking for what they call justice. But then again, justice is just giving persons their due. During her days of power, she made off money with illegal deals and corrupt practices. During her days of power, she made deals with election officers to cheat off her victory. During her days of power, she was responsible for the abductions and extrajudicial killings. Where in the world is the justice here? Is embezzling the money of the people just? Is cheating in the elections just? Is murdering others just? Is abducting one's critics constitutional?
Readers, Arroyo has no right to talk about justice and constitutionality. With all her nine years of very impressive unjust and unconstitutional track record, we cannot really let her go and escape the weight of her crimes. Justice must be served. After all that she had done to the people, she must taste her own medicine. Depriving her of 'much-needed' medical treatment abroad may deem unconstitutional and unjust, but during her time, isn't she also like that? It is just giving what is due to her. It is also justice, in a sense.
