PGMA harbors no ill-feelings to partymates who jumped ship

President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has no ill feelings among partymates in Lakas-Kampi-CMD who recently bolted the administration party.

Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita said members of Lakas-Kampi-CMD who shifted to other parties have their own personal reasons.

He told reporters after attending the Lakas-Kampi-CMD national convention on Thursday at the Philippine International Convention Center (PICC) in Pasay City that President Arroyo has no grudge against former party mates who have decided to jump ship.

Ermita added President Arroyo is clearly a well-seasoned veteran in politics and she did not consider as “traitorship” the move of some Lakas-Kampi-CMD members who decided desert the administration party in favor of other political parties which they deemed could provide them a better political edge in the elections.

He added Quezon City Mayor Feliciano ?Sonny? Belmonte Jr. have asked permission and relayed to the party on his move to join Liberal Party (LP) together with Vice-Mayor Herbert Bautisa and his daughter Joy Belmonte.

Ermita stressed Mayor Belmonte?s late wife, Betty Go-Belmonte, is very close to the late President Cory Aquino and Mayor Belmonte served as chairman of Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) during the term of President Aquino before he decided to run for congressman in Quezon City.

The senior Palace official said that while there are some of its members shifting to the Liberal Party, there are also LP members joining the Lakas-Kampi-CMD like Caloocan City Rep. Mitch Cayanon and Marinduque Governor Bong Carreon.

Ermita stressed that the Lakas-Kampi-CMD is still the strongest and most organized political party in the country with some 3,000 local leaders attended the national convention in PICC wherein the party officially announced its standard bearer former Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro Jr. and his runningmate former Optical Media Board chairman Edu Manzano.