Alleba Politics

The opposition will not bring the impeachment case to the Supreme Court.

President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo surprisingly appointed Philippine Armed Forces deputy Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Edilberto Adan as Southern Command Chief. Earlier, the AFP Board of Generals recommended Maj. Gen. Samuel Bagasin. PGMA’s surprise appointment of Adan raised a lot of eyebrows.

Rep Imee Marcos admits that she was absent during the voting for the adoption of the House Justice Committee report on the impeachment cases because of her mom’s stand to side with Arroyo.

Officials in the Malacañang are apparently not aware that the national government hired a lobby firm in the United States to lobby for grants from the US Congress to support the Charter change.

Sen. Richard Gordon expresses his dismay at an alleged trade-off between President Arroyo and Rep. Eulogio Magsaysay. Allegedly, the planned revocation of an EO banning the importation of used vehicles into Subic Bay is the price for Rep. Magsaysay’s withdrawal of his signature in the impeachment cases. Gordon threatens to break off his political ties with the president (which is definitely something that the president would not want to happen). Gordon also bared that about P26 billion in tax collections were lost in the last three years due to the smuggling into Subic Bay of second-hand vehicles, tobacco products and liquor in Subic.

Meanwhile, Sec. Ermita denies that there is a plan to lift the ban on the importation of second-hand vehicles into Subic Bay.

Sen. Ralph Recto bared that the national government used the controversial road users’ tax to create “street sweeping” jobs for the first half of 2005. 370,000 of these jobs were created, which Recto pointed out, is much more than the jobs created in the agriculture sector during the same period.

As the leadership of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines changes on December 1, 2005, the pastoral stand of the group is likely to change too.

Both Shell and Caltex raised their petrol prices by P0.50/liter.

The peso is at P56.06 per US dollar.

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