MANILA, 3 July 2004 — Twenty women have sued for libel against a Catholic bishop who accused them of acting like “GROs” during the birthday party of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo’s husband, Jose Miguel Arroyo.
The women, mostly employees of the government-run gambling agency Pacgcor, said they were were hurt by Pangasinan Archbishop Oscar V. Cruz’s statement, which placed them in bad light. Cruz’s statement was apparently aimed at the Philippine Amusement and Gambling Corp. for giving its female workers “an embarrassing assignment to entertain the first gentleman and his close associates.”
“They were carefully made up and dressed exceptionally well. ... One special instruction given was they should not wear their wedding rings, if any,” he said in a statement after the party last Saturday. “The gathering was certainly not for the benefit of either charitable works or sports events.”
But the women took offense, according to Pagcor media coordinator Edward King, because they were depicted in a bad light.
Pagcor chairman Efraim C. Genuino, a known friend of the president’s husband, criticized the bishop for making the statement without verifying first.
“It should not have been an issue in the first place because nothing wrong happened at the first gentleman’s birthday bash. The women were there to serve as usherettes and not as GROs. However, since the archbishop has been so obviously misled yet again by his sources, and reacted according to what he thought was right, I urge the women to exercise tolerance toward his actions,” he said in a press statement.
Genuino also said he will not stop the women from taking legal course of action. “It is their right. I believe that the blow to their reputations and the humiliation they experienced are just cause for them to seek recompense.”
Cruz said he was unfazed by the libel case.
He sad he was willing to go to jail if that was what it would take for “call(ing) national attention to the evil of this Pagcor.”
He said the women were told to dance with the guests and entertain them. “That’s very sleazy. This is exploitation,” he later told reporters.
In an earlier statement, the Pagcor women echoed Mike Arroyo’s assurance that the affair was “wholesome,” attended by their parents, as well as 1,700 top officials with their spouses in attendance. “Far from being the sleazy gathering Archbishop Cruz imagined, the dinner-dance was a wholesome family affair attended by close friends of the first couple,” they said.
The president’s husband had earlier called Cruz a “liar.”
“Even my apos (grandchildren) were there and I was dancing with them,” he said to stress that the 20 usherettes were not asked to do anything indecent. (Additional input from agencies)
