Bayan to join Makati rally on Friday

Press statement
February 12, 2008
Reference: Renato Reyes Jr., Secretary-General

Umbrella group Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) announced today that it will participate in the protest action being organized by various anti-Arroyo forces on Friday at Makati City’s central business district to condemn the rampant corruption in government and call for Gloria Arroyo’s ouster.

“We will join the protests to show our outrage over the shameless cover-up of corruption. The arrogance and impunity of the Arroyo regime and its brazen use of state machinery to silence and harass people like Jun Lozada are too much”, said Bayan secretary general Renato Reyes Jr.

Bayan and its allied organizations have picketed the Senate main gate during the hearings on Lozada’s exposé on the $329-million national broadband network (NBN) scam and his abduction by Malacañang people in an attempt to stop him from testifying before the senators.

Reyes said that the people’s protests will surely snowball as public indignation on the NBN scam and the kidnapping of Lozada, the latest in the growing list of crimes against the people by the Arroyo regime, intensifies. “The Senate hearing yesterday only further weakened the alibis of Malacañang and strengthened the credibility of Lozada’s account of his abduction”, said the Bayan leader.

Bayan maintained that Arroyo has nowhere to go but out of Malacañang. “The only way out of the political crisis is for Gloria to step down and be made accountable for her crimes”, Reyes pointed out.

Bayan and its allied militant organizations will assemble at 2:00 PM at the Rustan’s Makati along Ayala Avenue. (END)