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President Arroyo asked: Did the 14 Comelec directors meet in your La Vista home on May 6, 2004?

President Arroyo asked: Did the 14 Comelec directors

meet in your La Vista home on May 6, 2004?

Did they or did not they? 

Staunch critics of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo on Saturday asked the embattled Chief Executive to honestly answer alleged reports that on May 6, 2004 , 14 regional directors of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) met at the Arroyos’ residence in La Vista subdivision in Quezon City to receive P 2 million each from Lilia Pineda, wife of Pampanga-based jueteng lord Bong Pineda, an alleged supporter of Ms Arroyo in the last May 10 ,2004 elections.

The jueteng payoff was allegedly facilitated by controversial Comelec Commissioner Virgilio Garcillano and was witnessed by Ms Arroyo during the clandestine meeting at the Arroyos’ La Vista residence in Quezon City.

“ It is answerable by yes or no. But Ms Arroyo has no option but to tell the truth and nothing but the truth”, said the militant fisherfolk group Pambansang Lakas ng Kilusang Mamamalakaya ng Pilipinas (Pamalakaya) in a press statement.

The group added: “ Of course we don’t want a second serving of I am sorry due to lapse in judgment from Ms Arroyo. We better tell her to go to hell.”

Based on an account given to the Inquirer, Garcillano was there along with the 14 regional directors of the Comelec and was the one allegedly calling the shots when the poll body’s directors met at the Arroyo residence four days before the May 10, 2004 elections.

A source said the Comelec regional directors started arriving at 4 p.m and stayed at 10 p.m where they were treated by Ms Arroyo with “ bacalao and steak” for dinner. The source also said the witness also quoted Ms Arroyo telling election officials “ kayo na ang bahala”  ( I leave it all in your hands).

Presidential Management Staff (PMS) Chief Rigoberto Tiglao said the report was a hogwash adding that the opposition calling for the resignation of President Arroyo was getting  less and less imaginative in pursuing its’ objective to remove the embattled Executive Chief from power.

But Pamalakaya national chair Fernando Hicap asserted that the detailed and vivid description of the May 6, 2004 story was not hogwash or a product of less imaginative mind but a blow-by-blow account of what was really happening inside the Arroyos political waterhole in La Vista.

 “ We don’t think the story about the 14 regional directors of Comelec having a clandestine meeting at the Arroyos’ La Vista hide out was a pulp political fiction. Based on the detailed account and presentation by the source of the news story, we conclude that the story true”, Hicap said.

Pamalakaya urged all the Senate committees in-charge of the jueteng gate investigation to immediately summon the 14 Comelec regional directors next week and compel them to tell the truth before the committees and the public closely monitoring the development on the jueteng payola scandal.

“ Let them face the nation and tell the people exactly what were they doing in La Vista in the afternoon till late evening of May 6, 2004. For their information the Arroyos’ La Vista residence in Quezon City is not an extension branch of the Comelec national office in Intramuros, Manila”, the militant group added. #

 

 

 

 

 

posted by: GerryCorpuz at 02:12 | link | comments |

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