|
A FORMER
president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the
Philippines (CBCP) said on Thursday the bishops did not
get along with the “growing clamor for [President
Arroyo’s] resignation” because they feel that the Senate
inquiry into alleged government kickbacks in the botched
$329-national broadband network deal is flawed.
Bishop
Orlando Quevedo said: “[The] present process of arriving
at the truth is seriously flawed for a number of
reasons, which include views the Senate has become a
partisan venue for the opposition to pile up charges
upon charges, proven or not, for their own political
interests,” said the Cotabato archbishop.
This as
Quevedo said the perceived division in the CBCP “could
be a media creation,” saying many members of the press
interview only anti-Arroyo bishops.
“The
image of a divided hierarchy could be a media creation.
Four or five bishops with a contrary opinion receive a
lot of disproportionate media exposure and mileage. If
one studies newspaper reports and interviews, their
names appear again and again. Yet, bishops with this
contrary opinion constitute less than 10 percent of the
whole hierarchy,” Quevedo stressed.
Quevedo
said of the 100 active voting members of the bishops’
organization who were present during the February 26
emergency meeting, less than 10 are proresignation and
“such number do not make a divided CBCP.”
Those
who are known to be critical against Arroyo are
Archbishop Oscar Cruz of Lingayen-Dagupan and bishops
Antonio Tobias of Novaliches, Deogracias Iñiguez of
Caloocan, Julio Labayen of Infanta and the see-less
Teodoro Bacani.
At the
same time, Quevedo and Archbishop Fernando Capalla of
Davao, both former CBCP presidents, denied that the
present political crisis has divided the group and
created so-called blocs for and against President
Arroyo’s continued stay in power.
Quevedo,
who served as CBCP president during the Estrada
administration, said reports of a “Mindanao bloc” among
the bishops who were allegedly responsible for “saving”
Arroyo were “absolutely false.”
“The
unity of the bishops has always been there, even when
they issued their statement on July 10, 2005 that they
were not demanding the resignation of the President,”
Quevedo said in a statement.
Many
groups and individuals called for Arroyo’s resignation
during that period because of the “Hello, Garci”
scandal.
Capalla,
who assumed leadership of the CBCP after Quevedo, also
denied that calls for the bishops’ support to ask Arroyo
to resign, have split the group.
Capalla
reiterated that the CBCP, that held an emergency meeting
last week, have unamimously voted not to call for Arroyo
to step down even if it condemned the culture of
corruption which it said is happening from “top to
bottom.”
“It
should be noted that we never discussed the resignation
of the President. We know this is a political exercise
which is not within our competence as bishops,” he said.
But
while saying there are no pro-Arroyo blocs within the
CBCP, bishops from Mindanao, and Northern Luzon, have
earlier released separate statements assuring their
support for Arroyo to finish her term until 2010.
On
Wednesday five unnamed bishops met with the President
and some members of the Cabinet at the Discovery Suites
in Ortigas, afterwhich, the revocation of Executive
Order 464 was announced by the Malacañang.
None of
the bishops known to be allies of the President admitted
being present during the meeting as the CBCP leadership
denies receiving an invite during the dialogue.
“I was
in Davao the whole day yesterday [Wednesday]. I’m still
in
Davao today,” Capalla said in a text message.
Bishop
Ramon Villena of Bayombong, who admits being friends
with Arroyo and says he uses his relationship with her
as a “bridge” to lobby for the needs of his diocese,
also denied being in the meeting. |
