Press Statement

Filipinos in Canada demand for the ouster of Philippine President Arroyo

For immediate release, February 28, 2008 

Tomorrow, Friday, February 29, local progressive Filipinos will rally outside the offices of the Philippine Consulate (700 West Pender Street, corner of Pender and Granville) to call for the ouster of Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.  A delegation of leaders from progressive Filipino organizations in BC will also present the Consul with an open letter of concern about the intensifying political and economic crisis in the Philippines. 

According to a statement, the group says, “the recent developments in the Philippines expose the corruption and connivance within President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s regime.”  Recently, Arroyo signed a $329 (USD) million National Broadband Network deal that allegedly gives a large sum of profit to members of her Cabinet, her husband, political and business supporters.  Despite publicly admitting her knowledge of the deal’s anomalies she signed the deal and did not call for an investigation.  “Top government officials in Arroyo’s regime have desperately tried to cover-up this scandal and silence the whistleblowers and its opposition through coercion, kidnapping and intimidation tactics,” says the group.

“As overseas Filipinos in Canada, we are outraged by this scandal and by Arroyo’s overall disregard for the Filipino people in the Philippines and abroad,” asserts Glecy Duran, Chairperson of SIKLAB-BC, an overseas Filipino workers organization.

Since 2004, peoples’ organizations in the Philippines under BAYAN, an alliance of patriotic and peoples’ organizations, including those in Canada have been calling for Arroyo’s ouster because of corruption, electoral fraud, poverty, landlessness, and human rights violations.

“Progressive Filipinos in BC are fed up that the Arroyo regime continues to freely export Filipino workers to countries like Canada, where Filipino workers face racism, violence, economic exploitation and oppression, and little to no protection from the Philippine government.  Arroyo’s Philippine Labour Secretary Arturo Brion recently signed a two-year memorandum of understanding with the BC government which will import more Filipino temporary workers under exploitative conditions.  Arroyo continues to send Filipino women to Canada as modern-day slaves under Canada’s Live-in Caregiver Program.  Arroyo continues to ignore the impacts of family separation on Filipino youth in Canada, especially the children of the domestic workers.  As a consequence of social alienation, Filipino youth have a one of the highest drop out rates.  Some Filipino youth have even been killed: Deeward Ponte, Jomar Lanot, Jeffery Reodica.”

“We want the Philippine Consulate, the local representative of Arroyo’s government, to know that overseas Filipinos abroad are not turning a blind eye to the Arroyo regime’s corruption and theft and to the regime’s seven years of anti-people rule.  We are enraged, we are politicized, and we join the global call for the ouster of President Arroyo,” continues Duran.

On Friday, overseas Filipinos and concerned Canadians will join the coordinated international protest mass actions to strengthen the movement for Arroyo’s ouster.  They also support the call of the Filipino people for a government to replace Arroyo that will promote the advancement of the people’s struggle for a sovereign, democratic, progressive and pro-people system.#

RALLY
“Oust the corrupt and fascist Arroyo from the Philippine presidency”
Friday, February 29, 2008
5pm – 6pm
Philippine Consulate in Vancouver
700 West Pender Street (on the corner of Pender and Granville)

Community Forum
On the recent developments and the peoples’ struggle for alternative pro-people system in the Philippines
Sunday, March 30, 2008
1pm – 4pm
Kalayaan Centre in Vancouver
451 Powell St (between Jackson and Dunlevy)

Organized by the B.C. Committee for Human Rights in the Philippines, Filipino Nurses Support Group, Philippine Women Centre of B.C., SIKLAB-B.C. (Advance the Rights and Welfare of Overseas Filipino Workers and their Families), Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada/Filipino-Canadian Youth