Is the President becoming ungentlemanly?

President Benigno Aquino III AP PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines — House minority leader Danilo Suarez on Wednesday slammed President Benigno Aquino III’s wheelchair joke during his state visit in New Zealand, saying it is no longer a laughing matter to take another swipe at ailing former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

“We in the House minority take offense at the President’s jokes at the expense of his predecessor before a Filipino audience and the international media in New Zealand,” he said during a press conference.

Suarez, an Arroyo ally, called the President’s actions “ungentlemanly and unbecoming” for his position in the government.

“It is insensitive to an ailing grandmother and disrespectful to a former head of state,” he argued.

Zambales Representative Milagros Magsaysay, a member of the minority bloc, has earlier hit back at Aquino’s criticisms on Arroyo, saying that the President was being unfair to “an opponent who is already down.”

Arroyo is presently under hospital arrest at the Veterans Memorial Medical Center for charges of plunder in connection to the allegedly misused intelligence funds of the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office.