GLORIA

MACAPAGAL
ARROYO
 Arroyos father, Diosdado P. Macapagal, was
president of the Philippines from 1961 to 1965.
Arroyo studied economics at Georgetown
University in Washington, D.C., where she began
a lasting friendship with classmate and future
U.S. president Bill Clinton. After returning to the
Philippines and graduating magna cum laude
from Assumption College in Manila in 1968,
Arroyo earned a masters degree in economics
(1978) from Ateneo de Manila University and a
doctorate in economics (1986) from the
University of the Philippines in Quezon City.
 Arroyo was a university professor when Pres. Corazon
Aquino appointed her undersecretary of trade and
industry in 1986. She won a seat in the Senate in
1992 and was reelected in 1995 by a record 16 million
votes. She was elected vice president in 1998,
garnering more votes than the winner of the
presidency, Joseph Estrada, who named Arroyo
secretary of social welfare and development. In 2000,
however, a corruption scandal enveloped Estrada, and
on October 12 Arroyo resigned from the cabinet post
to rally opposition against him. Angry protesters
drove Estrada from the presidential residence on
January 20, 2001, and Arroyo assumed power.
 Arroyo brought an unprecedented academic and
administrative background to the Philippines presidency, but
her tenure was plagued by political unrest. Just months after
she took office, some 20,000 supporters of Estrada stormed the
gates of the presidential palace. Several people were killed,
and Arroyo declared a state of rebellion that lasted five days.
In 2003 disaffected soldiers seized a Manila apartment
building and demanded Arroyos resignation; the attempted
coup was suppressed peacefully. Promising to reduce
corruption and improve the economy, Arroyo was reelected
president in 2004. However, accusations that she rigged the
election emerged the following year and resulted in a failed
attempt at impeachment. In 2006 Arroyo declared a
countrywide state of emergency after a military coup was
blocked; the state of emergency was lifted after about one
week. Terrorism was also a concern for Arroyos
administration. Abu Sayyaf, a terrorist group that sought a
separate Islamic state in the southern Philippines, was
responsible for a number of attacks, including the 2004
bombing of a ferry that killed more than 100 people
 In late 2009, after members of a politically powerful clan
in Mindanao were implicated in the massacre of a political
opponent and his entourage there, Arroyo briefly
declared martial law in the region. She also renounced ties
with the clan, which until then had been a political ally.
Constitutionally barred from seeking another six-year
presidential term, she ran for and won a seat in the House of
Representatives in the May 2010 presidential and
parliamentary elections. Arroyo subsequently was
investigated for various alleged crimes, and in 2011 the
government barred her from leaving the country to seek
medical treatment. In November she was arrested on charges
of having committed electoral fraud during the 2007 Senate
election. She pleaded not guilty to those charges in February
2012. However, the following month, new allegations were
brought that stated that she and her husband had accepted
bribes from a Chinese telecommunications company in 2007.
She was released from custody on bail in July 2012. Later that
year Arroyo was arrested for allegedly misusing
state lottery funds while president.
FRIENDNIE A. AYA
To ms. Aprilyn Limosnero