MANILA – He is muddling the issue. This was the opposition’s stand on the statements of former Commission on Elections commissioner Virgilio Garcillano, who claimed that the conversation he had with President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo were not unique or unusual. Garcillano said he had similar conversations with many oppositionists, including senators Juan Ponce Enrile and Jamby Madrigal, and even House Minority Leader Francis Escudero, who denied the claim.

Escudero accused the Arroyo administration of deflecting public attention from the President’s alleged cheating by aiming its guns at the opposition.

While still in hiding, Garcillano told the Philippine Daily Inquirer the other day that he had talked to a number of politicians during last year’s election period, including Fernando Poe Jr’s running mate Loren Legarda.

COMMENT: Despite Escudero’s denial, the admission of other oppositionists that they had had conversations with Garcillano similar to the one the Comelec commissioner had with the President has dealt a telling blow to the anti-Arroyo forces. Their bid to oust Mrs. Arroyo via forced resignation has been weakened and their hopes of impeaching her have all but disappeared. Despite so many calls for her to resign, President Arroyo is showing enough political strength to ride out this storm.

She is not as unpopular as her enemies believe.