Written by Tribune Editorial
Monday, 06 October 2014
The Palace is again taking on a fireman’s job amid the spreading call for Noynoy to step down and amid charges of incompetence and outright abuse of power.
Several civic groups, many of which were ardent Aquino supporters way back even before Noynoy’s mother, Cory, became president in 1986, are now calling for him to step down for various reasons including the crafting of the law that would create a Bangsamoro substate, his support for charter change, or cha-cha, Noynoy’s defiance of the Supreme Court order declaring unconstitutional the Priority Development Assistance Fund, the Disbursement Acceleration Program and the coddling of his corrupt allies.
Presidential spokesman Abigail Valte followed up on Edwin Lacierda’s effort to belittle the National Transformation Council (NTC) raising questions on the backing of the group.
Valte said that the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines has not acknowledged the Church’s support for NTC nor its aims, despite the laity making up the core of the group.
She added that Cebu Cardinal Emeritus Ricardo Vidal had denied asking Noynoy to resign.
The NTC, nonetheless, agreed with Valte that Vidal did not seek the resignation of Noynoy.
In a statement, it noted that neither the NTC nor Vidal nor the signatories of the Lipa and Cebu Declarations have ever asked Aquino to resign.
“This is contrary to what ABS-CBN, Edwin Lacierda, Franklin Drilon and others have been claiming. What NTC urges President Aquino to do immediately is to relinquish or to step down from his position,” according to the group.
The NTC said there is a difference between resigning and relinquishing power.
“If one asks President Aquino to resign, it means that one acknowledges him to be the duly-elected president of the Philippines, while if one asks him to relinquish or to step down from his position, it means that one is asking him to vacate the post of the President of the Republic of the Philippines because he is not duly-elected for that position by the people of the Philippines,” the NTC explained.
It insisted that Aquino and his allies “were illegally elected in 2010 and in 2013.”
That Noynoy and his allies manipulated the automated elections under his term in 2010 and 2013 was another reason the NTC gave for asking Noynoy to resign.
Semantics aside, the group is seeking a new order in which and Noynoy and his opportunistic allies are removed from power to allow the rebuilding of a government free from the corrupt practices that is said to be deeply ingrained in the fabric of the political system.
Noynoy and the Liberal Party (LP) represent the corrupt system sought to be perpetuated through a manipulated voting process. Valte said that the Palace does not intend to meet with any members of the NTC since they have not reached out to the administration to bring their demands on Aquino.
It seems that the Palace has issued an invitation for the group to be coopted, similar to what has been done to Akbayan, a former reformist group whose officials are either with Congress or have lucrative posts in government and no longer criticize the administration, despite its many criminal and unconstitutional acts committed by Noynoy and its allies.
The call for Noynoy to step down is valid and the complaints raised against him should have been reviewed exhaustively if not for his allies who swiftly dismissed all the impeachment complaints against Noynoy.
All that is being undertaken, including the supposed allegations of corruption against all leaders of the opposition, is in line with efforts to remove all hurdles for Noynoy and the LP to extend their dominance beyond 2016.
Noynoy and the LP should look back in history regarding the tipping point for the seemingly tolerant public.
Either through the vote or street protests, the abusers always end up booted out of power. - The Daily Tribune
