Kapampangan supporters of the President obtained a copy of two sets of documents detailing the alleged plot, one of which is five pages titled “People Power through the Stop Now Arroyo’s Plunder (SNAP) Election: An Urgent Constitutional Solution to the Present Leadership Crisis”.
The other related three-page document was titled “Concept of SNAP” and was apparently written by one person as introduction to the former document with attached signatures.
“SNAP will be a signature campaign exactly or nearly exactly like the signature campaign launched by Gov. Eddie Panlilio’s enemies against him in Pampanga,” the document said.
“It will call for the recall of GMA (Pres. Arroyo) on the ground of illegitimacy. It will go on to call for snap presidential elections to solve the problem of illegitimacy,” it said in its first paragraph.
The main document, detailing legal processes that could lead to snap elections, contained the signatures of 33 people and the organizations where they purportedly belong to.
The signatories included one who identified himself as Jun Lozada who, however, left blank the space for his organization and one Fr. Joe Dizon who identified his organization as Solidarity Phils.
The other signatories named their organizations as UMDJ, Concerned Citizens Movement, Catholic Lay Preachers Association of the Phils., Ang Karapatan, Bayan, KMLG and NUSP, among other groups.
The President’s supporters asked not to be named, but said yesterday they had alerted and furnished Malacanang with copies of the documents.
The writer of the introductory document cited two justifications for snap elections. “One, it takes an offensive rather than defensive stance” and “two, the capacity of Senate hearings like the current ones on Joc-Joc Bolante and the Euro generals to stoke the public to outrage and do something about malfeasance has become increasingly suspect”.
“The hearings alone can not rouse the people to outrage or action. But a signature campaign to recall GMA can and will heighten the drama of the hearings and extend their possibilities,” said the document.
It also cited eight advantages of such a signature campaign. “It has a sense of urgency. It means to accomplish something now rather than later,” it said.
It also cited other advantages such as its “offering poetic justice”, “articulates and dramatizes the people’s anger”, “makes people do something”, “is graphic, visual, and has immense media possibilities”, “has potential of becoming immensely popular”, “can be long-drawn and continuous” and, “at the very least it can stop Charter Change dead in its tracks”.
“We should be forewarned that Malacanang will not just try to disrupt this by thugs and goons, by salvaging and forced disappearances, but by mounting a signature campaign of their own- one to show GMA is beloved by the poor and the rural folk, a la Marcos,” the writer warned.
The five-page document cited the Supreme Court as having said that the 1987 Constitution “institutionalized people power in law-making” by allowing direct people’s initiatives to repeal national laws through a petition of at least 12 percent of total number of registered voters.
The document proposed people’s initiative to amend the transitory provision of the 1987 Charter to shorten the President’s term up to May 10, 2009 to pave the way for snap elections.
“Resort to constitutional amendment calling for a popular vote on the incumbency of the Chief Executive avoids all sorts of questions that may be raised about the continued democratic propriety of yet another popular uprising to force an incumbent President out of office,” it said.
It noted that “where people formerly speak of ‘people power fatigue’, they may now see in the SNAP election a creative if not an empowering political process that we well promises to lay the groundwork for a future people’s congress.”
