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Alan Robles

When she was hoisted to power last year, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo called for the creation of a 'new politics', but now she is starting to act like a politician of the old stripe.

Recently her administration offered jobs to a crony of the late former dictator Ferdinand Marcos and to three close associates of the disgraced ex-president Joseph Estrada. When a government appointee publicly complained about it, Mrs Arroyo fired him.

The president, who likes to project a tough image, said: 'A strong republic cannot afford to have termites from within.'

Political analysts say the president is trying to both gather allies and end a Senate standoff. But she is playing a dangerous game.

Her attempts to recruit former members of the discredited Estrada administration have raised the prospect that, far from dividing her foes, she is splitting her allies.

Mrs Arroyo is offering the position of foreign secretary to opposition Senator Blas Ople, who helped Marcos run his dictatorship. Senator Ople has been called 'an opportunist masquerading as a statesman' by political analyst Amando Doronila.

By luring Senator Ople to her cabinet, Mrs Arroyo hopes to gain a majority in the Senate and have her legal initiatives passed.

The president's husband, Mike Arroyo, is trying to recruit Ronaldo Puno, an Estrada crony who served as local government secretary until he stepped down because of corruption allegations.

Mr Arroyo likened Mr Puno and two other Estrada cronies he has held talks with to 'volunteers who want to help the government'. But Mr Puno is widely believed to have masterminded a campaign of dirty tricks to help Imelda Marcos win office under martial law.

Coming on the heels of the morally dubious Estrada government, President Arroyo's administration was expected to set a high tone. In her inaugural speech last year, she said: 'We need to outgrow our traditional brand of politics.'

In the Philippines, traditional politics is a feudalistic system of usually dynastic elites who use official power for family and personal gain. The late politician Benigno Aquino best summed up how trapos - or traditional politicians -  maintain the system: 'Guns, goons and gold.'

At the time she assumed office, Mrs Arroyo gave one indication that she might not be all that different from trapos. Some of her supporters implored her to stop one of her children running for political office but she turned a deaf ear.

Unfortunately, as a politician Mrs Arroyo suffers from three handicaps. First, she was not elected but succeeded to office.

Second, she has no clear power base -  the masses still support Estrada. The latest survey places Mrs Arroyo's approval rating at only four per cent.

Third, Mrs Arroyo has had to learn on the job. Before she became president her only previous executive experience was a stint as undersecretary at the Department of Trade.

It also does not help that she chooses to disdain politics, preferring to call attention to her economic performance.

But in this country politics and economics are intertwined. And by emphasising her economist skills she is only tacitly admitting to her political shortcomings. Mrs Arroyo's efforts to appear tough sometimes make her seem merely overbearing - although she was right to fire the dissenting official, her use of the word 'termites' is now starting to haunt her.

According to Mr Doronila, the analyst, Mrs Arroyo is building 'on the shifting sands of political opportunism'.



Arroyo stamps on 'termites' but eats away her own rule