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By ELLEN TORDESILLAS (First published on Aug. 11, 2005) SOME members of the political opposition say they would be happily surprised if former Isabela governor Faustino Dy, Jr. would decide to spill the beans on what he witnessed during the many times that he was with Gloria Arroyo during the 2004 elections campaign. That’s because

By YVONNE CHUA (First published on Aug. 11, 2005) PRESIDENT Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo allegedly met Commission on Elections (Comelec) field officials not once, but twice, at her home in La Vista, Quezon City in January of 2004. On both occasions, the president asked for the support of Comelec officials for her candidacy. And, in the first

By YVONNE CHUA (First published in July 2005) WHEN the official canvassing of votes ended on June 20, 2004, those who were monitoring the count already thought that the results from the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) looked suspicious. Even Mahar Mangahas of the Social Weather Stations (SWS) could not help but notice the

By YVONNE CHUA (First published in September 2005) IN THE May 2004 elections, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo maintained a campaign organization so elaborate it even included a group dubbed “Special Ops,” an infamous abbreviation for “special operations” that many equate with “dirty tricks,” or cruder still, poll cheating. What the “Special Ops” group under then

By YVONNE CHUA (First published in July 2005) OFFICIALLY, it’s President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo who, according to Congress’s canvassing, posted a 1.1- million lead over opposition candidate Fernando Poe Jr. But with the subject of electoral fraud reverberating throughout the wiretapped conversations of then Elections Commissioner Virgilio Garcillano and Arroyo, people are beginning to wonder:

By LUZ RIMBAN (First published on Aug. 28, 2005) THERE ARE virtually no farms in Las Piñas, Parañaque, Quezon City and certainly not in Makati. Yet these overbuilt and densely-populated cities were among at least 100 congressional districts that, according to the Department of Agriculture (DA), needed P1.8 billion in farm inputs and implements in

By LUZ RIMBAN (First published in July 2005) PITY party-list organizations. Although Republic Act 7941 reserves 20 percent of House seats for these groups, which are supposed to be from marginalized sectors whose interests are not represented in Congress, the reality is that it is difficult for them to win votes. That’s because Filipinos are

By BOOMA B. CRUZ (First published on Oct. 20, 2005) POONA BAYABAO, Lanao del Sur — “Fernando Poe, Fernando Poe.” With clenched fists and his right hand raised, octogenarian Hadji Mohammad Monte repeated the name of the late action star like a mantra when asked whom he voted for in the last presidential elections. He

By LUZ RIMBAN (First published in April 2001) FOUR days after it assumed office, the government of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo gave the final approval to the most controversial power project in the country: a $470-million hydroelectric power contract that was awarded to the Argentine firm IMPSA (Industrias Metalurgicas Pescarmona Sociedad Anonima). For eight years, the