Estrada's olive branch rejected by Philippines vice president

Arroyo, right, says Estrada "has repeatedly made promises which have not been fulfilled"

MANILA (Reuters) -- Philippine Vice President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has rejected an offer from embattled President Joseph Estrada to take the nation's top economic position.

Estrada, facing threats of impeachment for allegedly taking bribes from illegal gambling, extended an olive branch to his political foes and said he would seek their counsel to help the country out of its economic mess.

But he stressed he would not step down.

"I will not resign," Estrada said in a televised address to the nation. "I will answer all the charges point by point at the proper time. Let the impeachment process take its due course."

AUDIO President Estrada says that he will not resign 449k/20 sec. AIFF or WAV sound Philippine Press Secretary Ricardo Puno comments on the vice president's rejection of Estrada's offer 426/19 sec. AIFF or WAV sound     MESSAGE BOARD Share your thoughts on today's events in the Philippines

Arroyo, who resigned from the Cabinet earlier this month after allegations emerged that Estrada had taken millions of dollars in bribes from illegal gambling syndicates, told television: "He has repeatedly made promises which have not been fulfilled, it will not really help."

She promised to continue to campaign for his removal from office.

Estrada said he would relinquish the chairmanship of the Economic Coordinating Council, a high-powered Cabinet committee which oversees all economic policy, if Arroyo agreed to take it over.

Provincial Gov. Luis Singson has said he personally collected and handed more than $11 millionin payoffs and kickbacks to Estrada. The Philippine president has denied the corruption charges but Arroyo, along with the influential Roman Catholic Church and major business groups, has said he must quit. "It is the people who will act (if he does not resign)," she said.

Interior secretary to investigate

Opposition congressman Hernani Braganza said Estrada's speech was not convincing. "He's trying to appease a cynical population and offering many carrots, but it is too late," Braganza told Reuters. "He has already polarized the country."

Estrada referred to what he called perceptions that his administration was favoring "cronies" and to media reports that he had acquired lavish mansions, one of which is supposedly being used by a former lover.

He said he had authorized his interior secretary "to investigate the legitimacy of the acquisition and ownership of the five or six houses that newspaper reports have linked to me with the view of causing their forfeiture in favor of the state if the evidence so warrants."

Estrada also ordered the closure of duty free shops linked to smuggling activities and revoked an executive order that allowed a monopoly in port services -- two business areas which the media have said are controlled by presidential friends.

Stressing he would not yield to demands from business, media and other pressure groups that he step down, Estrada said: "My personal fate as your president will be determined under the constitution... The power and authority of the constitution emanates from the people -- from all the people -- not from those with the loudest voices or the largest resources."

Estrada said he would convene the National Security Council to discuss how to defuse the political and economic crisis and that he would invite some of his harshest critics to attend -- including Arroyo and former presidents Corazon Aquino and Fidel Ramos.

After his address, the armed forces and police chiefs spoke on national television to say they would not allow any extra-constitutional forces to take over.

Singson, left, looks to his lawyer during a testimony at the Senate hearing into alleged gambling payoffs involving President Estrada on Monday

Call for 'supreme sacrifice'

Only hours earlier, 11 groups representing a large section of the country's business community declared in a joint statement that they had had enough.

"Given this crisis of leadership and governance and the loss of confidence in the administration, we call on the president to make the supreme sacrifice for the country and resign," they said.

Estrada also took a blow from the Senate. Two opposition senators filed a resolution asking the chamber to appeal to the president "to immediately resign" to stop the free-fall of the economy and heal the nation.

"I don't think he will survive this," Arroyo said earlier in the day of Estrada's chances of holding on to power. "If he survives, the economy will not."

Copyright 2000 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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President Joseph "Erap" Ejercito Estrada
Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's Website
Philippine House of Representatives

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