Teachers also want Mrs. Arroyo impeached

SCORES of public- and private-school teachers and university professors trooped to the House of Representatives on Thursday to sign the impeachment complaint against President Arroyo.
The “citizens’ complaint” charges President Arroyo with electoral fraud in the 2004 elections, violations of civil liberties and human rights and numerous acts of graft and corruption.
“Even if it has a slim chance of getting past Congress, we’re filing the impeachment complaint because we’re committed to exhausting every available venue within the democratic space to hold [Mrs.] Arroyo accountable for her numerous crimes against the citizenry,” said Antonio Tinio, chairman of the Alliance of Concerned Teachers, who signed the complaint along with about 50 other teachers.
Many of the complainants were public-school teachers who served as precinct-level election officials in the May 2004 elections.
“As teachers who served in the 2004 elections, we have a moral obligation to find out the whole truth about the cheating that took place in the presidential election,” Tess Busadre, president of the Quezon City Public-School Teachers’ Association, said.
“We took great pains to ensure that elections at the precinct level were clean and credible, only to find that election results could be manufactured during the canvassing period, making a mockery of the people’s right to choose their leaders. We hope that through the impeachment the truth can come out,” the teachers said.--Jonathan M. Hicap