Six officials from the Catholic Church and three members of religious groups have joined the National Transformation Council’s (NTC) call for President Benigno Aquino III to “step down.”
In Cebu City, retired Cebu Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal appealed to other bishops and religious leaders to join the Catholic Church in praying for God’s guidance “for the renewal of the nation.”
The archbishops who have supported the calls for President Aquino to resign are Romulo Dela Cruz of Zamboanga City and Ramon Arguelles of Lipa City in Batangas; Archbishop Emeritus Fernando Capalla of Davao, Bishop Ramon Villena of Bayombong, Nueva Viscaya and Bishop Filomeno Bactol of Naval, Biliran.
The Catholic Church leaders showed their support to calls for Aquino to resign during a recent gathering in Cebu City joined by NTC convenors former Defense Secretary Norberto Gonzales and former Senator Kit Tatad.
Other leaders present during the meeting were Bishop Butch Belgica and Bishop Jose Socito of Christian Bishops and Ministries in the Philippines and Evangelical Pastor Arthur Corpus of the United Church of Christ in the Philippines.
The bishops’ support was made during Vidal’s post-birthday party at his home in Sto. Niño Village in Banilad, Cebu City.
“The National Transformation Council has strongly articulated that the President should step down. We, bishops of the Catholic and other Christian Churches, have often been asked if there is moral basis to this growing demand. Recent developments have made this call even more urgent and imperative,” Vidal said in a statement during the event.
In the same event Tatad said: “The entire government must step down, including those who have claims to the line of presidential succession because as far as the NTC is concerned, the whole electoral process (in 2010) was fraudulent.”
He said that the NTC has received calls during their previous assemblies to organize a government that could fix the present system.
“Not to succeed president Aquino but to put in place a working democratic system where you have genuinely free elections and where you could hint to transform the structure of the government,” Tatad said.
Gonzales said that the NTC will not support a coup.
We are hoping that the people will have the courage to come out and support the call for Aquino to resign,” said Gonzales.