President Aquino wants Gloria Arroyo treated with ‘utmost respect’—De Lima
MANILA, Philippines—President Benigno Aquino III wants Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, being a former President, to be treated with “utmost respect,” Justice Secretary Leila de Lima said late Friday.
De Lima made the remark shortly before police officers were to serve the arrest warrant on Arroyo at St. Luke’s Medical Center in Taguig city.
The President will also not object if Arroyo, who is afflicted with a bone ailment, seeks house or hospital arrest while her electoral sabotage case is being heard, according to De Lima, citing her earlier conversation with Mr. Aquino who is in Indonesia for the 19th Asean summit.
Arroyo has been confined at the hospital since Tuesday night, when she made a foiled attempt to leave the country.
“For as long as she stays in the hospital, or maybe at home, we will not insist on bringing her to any detention facility. But the moment she leaves the premises, then our law enforcers are constrained to arrest her and put her in an appropriate detention facility,” De Lima said.
Policemen will secure the home or hospital where Arroyo is and “watch whether she would leave or not,” the justice secretary said.
Interior Secretary Jesse Robredo also said the Aquino administration would not object if Arroyo asked to be “detained” in her home or in the hospital.
Robredo said he contacted the former President’s son, Camarines Sur Rep. Diosdado “Dato” Arroyo as well as an Arroyo ally, Mayor Jerry Pelayo of Candaba, Pampanga, immediately after the warrant for her arrest was issued.
“We’ve notified the family because we will accord due respect to the former President at may sakit siya (since she is sick),” Robredo told the INQUIRER over the phone.
“Should she decide [she wants to stay] in the hospital or at home, that will be considered. Of course we will get permission from the court, but we will not object. If that is requested, we will not oppose,” he said.
But the administration will not allow Arroyo to leave the country, Robredo said. “If she goes to the airport, she will be arrested,” he said.
At a Palace news conference, De Lima said the warrant for Arroyo’s arrest had rendered “moot and academic” the issues surrounding the temporary restraining order issued by the Supreme Court, which sought to stop the Department of Justice from implementing its watch-list order on Arroyo and her husband.
“Thus, Ms Arroyo is compelled to stay in the country and face the charges of electoral sabotage filed against her, bringing us closer to uncovering the truth behind the controversies surrounding the 2007 elections,” De Lima said, reading from a prepared statement.
She expressed assurance that the government would “exercise fairness and impartiality, and uphold every right that Ms Arroyo, as an accused, is entitled to under the Constitution” throughout the judicial process.
“For a legal proceeding that has great implications not just to the integrity of the electoral system but also to the very principles of our nation’s democracy, it is our desire that truth and accountability prevail, and that the Filipino people are finally given the justice they truly deserve,” she said. With reports from Dona Z. Pazzibugan and Marlon Ramos
