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Explanation of GMA doctors sought

COURT PERMISSION was sought yesterday to determine the medical condition of Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo from her private physicians over claims that she needs to undergo treatment abroad for a deteriorating spine disorder.

The Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) requested in its urgent motion filed with the Supreme Court for the former president’s three doctors from St. Luke’s Medical Center in Taguig City to “appear and testify and bring before the honorable court the latest medical abstract” on her condition.

The three doctors -- Mario R. Ver, Juliet Gopez-Cervantes and Roberto C. Mirasol -- have been asked to appear in today’s oral arguments on travel ban orders issued against Mrs. Arroyo and her husband Jose Miguel “Mike” T. Arroyo. Mr. Arroyo’s name, however, has been taken off from the watch list order.

In his petition, the OSG noted that during oral arguments on Nov. 22 the justices raised questions “relative to the medical condition of petitioner.”

“There has likewise been a lingering question as to whether the current condition of petitioner GMA (Mrs. Arroyo’s initials)places her life in danger thereby necessitating her travel abroad,” it stated.

For her part, Justice Secretary Leila M. de Lima said the subpoena will settle the issue on Mrs. Arroyo’s real medical condition, citing the point raised by Chief Justice Renato C. Corona during Tuesday’s hearing.

“[The point that Justice Corona raised on the] right to life, which is supposed to be the highest human right under both our Constitution and under the Universal Declaration of Human Right, my opinion on that is if the right to life is being invoked, the premise should be that the former president’s condition should be life threatening,” Ms. de Lima told reporters in an ambush interview.

Meanwhile, the Commission on Elections (Comelec) yesterday filed its comment on the order of the Pasay Regional Trial Court for Mrs. Arroyo’s temporary hospital detention, court clerk Joel T. Pelicano said in a telephone interview.

The camp of the former president, he added, also filed yesterday a motion for a hospital arrest.

The Pasay court issued on Tuesday a temporary hospital arrest order for Mrs. Arroyo pending the submission of a medical abstract to help determine her stay in the hospital. The Comelec also filed a motion to determine the former president’s medical condition and for the issuance of subpoena requiring Mrs. Arroyo’s three doctors to appear before the court in tomorrow’s hearing.

The Palace, meanwhile, supported the subpoena of physicians and medical records relating to Mrs. Arroyo’s medical condition.

“We believe it is necessary... that we be able to determine the propriety of the hospital arrest... and... the real basis for the request to travel abroad...,” Presidential Spokesman Edwin Lacierda said in an interview yesterday.

In a related development, the Senate Blue Ribbon committee has also asked for a similar explanation from Mrs. Arroyo’s physicians.

“We will summon Ms. Arroyo’s doctors because the root of this controversy is the former president’s medical condition described as urgent and life-threatening,” committee chairman Teofisto L. Guingona III told reporters in a briefing yesterday.

The inquiry is based on a joint probe of the Blue Ribbon and electoral reforms committees on alleged fraud in the 2007 midterm elections. -- A. E. Barrameda and A. S. O. Alegado

(courtesy: Business World)