By Angelo L. Gutierrez (The Philippine Star) - MANILA, Philippines - A Catholic bishop is urging former president and now Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo to admit to allegations that she cheated to keep the presidency in 2004.
"Whether she really won or not, she should admit that she cheated. [A] repentant sinner is a saint before the Lord," Sorsogon Bishop Arturo Bastes said in an interview on Church-controlled Radio Veritas yesterday.
Bastes told Arroyo that telling the truth is the only way for her to come clean and "correct a mistake."
Retired Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Oscar Cruz, meanwhile, said that if people behind the cheating would choose to remain silent, he is confident that the truth will still come out.
“I am certain that in spite of whatever things are said and done the truth ultimately comes out. Like what they say that the truth will set you free,” Cruz said.
Manila Auxiliary Bishop Broderick Pabillo also warned those involved in the alleged election rigging that the “truth can never be hidden.”
“In the end the truth will come out. Those involved in the controversy should rectify their mistakes by coming out and revealing the whole truth,” said Pabillo.
Mrs. Arroyo and her husband, first gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo, have been accused of ordering vote-padding and -shaving of votes in 2004 and 2007.
Talk on the legitimacy of Mrs. Arroyo's presidency was revived with revelations of suspended ARMM governor Zaldy Ampatuan and former Maguindanao election supervisor Lintang Bedol.
Ampatuan and Bedol claimed that the former first couple ordered the shaving of votes from several senatorial candidates in 2007 and pad the votes to senatorial candidates who were running under the former president's ticket.
A group of policemen, led by Senior Superintendent Rafael Santiago, has also revealed the alleged switching of election returns (ERs) that were kept inside the Batasan Pambansa complex in 2005.
The policemen said that the former first gentleman ordered the operation, which was allegedly done in anticipation of Congress' approval of a petition by the camp of the late Fernando Poe Jr. to open the ERs.
Aside from allegations of their involvement in massive election fraud, the Arroyo couple are also facing a string of charges in the Office of the Ombudsman and the Department of Justice.
The couple has gone ill. Mrs. Arroyo had just been discharged from the hospital after undergoing a spinal surgery while Mr. Arroyo had to fly to Hong Kong for a full medical checkup.
