Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo is getting criticism for her Ashcroft-like remarks regarding support for joint U.S. and Philippine military exercises and action against Abu Sayyaf.
President vows: I won't stop until last Abu falls
Making her strongest defense yet of the controversial Philippine-US
Balikatan 02-1 military exercise in Mindanao, President Gloria
Macapagal-Arroyo declared Friday that anyone opposed to the presence
of American forces here to train local troops to fight the Abu Sayyaf
Muslim bandit group was "not a Filipino".
Speaking at her weekly press conference in Malacaņang, Ms Macapagal
said: "If you are not a Filipino, then who are you? A protector of
terrorists, a cohort of murderers, an Abu Sayyaf lover.
"You care more for terrorists than for your own soldier who defends
you. You care more for bandits and the camp of Osama bin Laden than
your country, which seeks to help you."
Macapagal slammed over remarks against US foes
"No President of the Philippines, and we have had 13 of them, had ever
dared say that any Filipino who happens to disagree with the President
is not a Filipino," Sen. Joker Arroyo of the ruling Lakas said in a
three-paragraph statement in his own handwriting.
"Not even (the late strongman Ferdinand) Marcos denied any of his
opponents their birthright," Arroyo said.
"Is this the measure of the President's IQ or that of her advisers?"
Why President Macapagal is suddenly talking like this is puzzling. She is an intelligent person, and it does not require great intelligence to know that there may be Filipinos who are opposed to the American military engagement in Mindanao precisely because they care for their country and the welfare of the Filipino soldier. What they oppose is not the campaign to terminate the Abu Sayyaf, but the use of means that are contrary to law and are likely to produce greater injury to the nation.
