Mendoza suffers heart attack

MANILA, Philippines—Former Transportation Secretary Leandro Mendoza was rushed to St. Luke’s Medical Center at Bonifacio Global City Saturday afternoon after suffering a heart attack.

Former DOTC chief Leandro Mendoza. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

Former Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board Chair Thompson Lantion said Mendoza was celebrating his birthday in advance at a resort in San Juan, Batangas, when the incident happened at around 4 p.m. He will turn 65 on March 24.

“He needed to be airlifted to the hospital after he complained of feeling dizzy then suddenly lying on the ground,” Lantion said in a telephone interview.

“His doctors say he is in stable condition but he needs to be observed for 24 hours.”

Prior to his appointment as former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s “Little President,” Mendoza served as transportation secretary. He signed the scandal-tainted $329-million National Broadband Network (NBN) deal with China’s ZTE Corp. in 2007.

Last Tuesday, the Sandiganbayan Fourth Division ordered the arrest of Mendoza, Arroyo and husband Jose Miguel Arroyo and former Commission on Elections Chair Benjamin Abalos for a graft case over the aborted NBN-ZTE deal.