Sunday, March 02, 2008
Cory confident Arroyo will be forced to step down (7:24 p.m.)
MANILA -- Former president Corazon Aquino said Sunday she expected public protests over a corruption scandal to eventually force President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to step down.
Aquino told more than 1,000 students, nuns and priests, who gathered to hear her speak after a mass held at a Roman Catholic university in Manila, that apathy among Filipinos could stall efforts to remove the president.
"We haven't fully awakened our countrymen, who seem to refuse to be roused from their slumber," Aquino said.
Aquino, who helped lead the country's 1986 "people power" revolt that ousted dictator Ferdinand Marcos, said she was not disheartened.
"If we were able to bring down a dictator to his knees, maybe it's easier now because there is no martial law," she said.
Aquino's comments follow the failure of Arroyo's opponents to muster enough public support to replicate the mammoth but nonviolent protests that toppled Marcos in 1986 and Joseph Estrada in 2001.
Aquino thanked young Filipinos who have begun to speak out against corruption.
She also urged corruption witness Rodolfo Lozada Jr. and his family to be patient amid their current difficulties. Lozada testified in the Senate that a major telecommunications deal endorsed by Arroyo was tainted with corruption. (AP) |
