Incoming AFP chief says he will support VP de Castro in case there is vacancy in the Presidency before 2010

By Ronron
March 3, 2008

Angeles City, Pampanga – Philippine Army chief Lt. Gen. Alexander Yano said Monday that he will support Vice President Noli de Castro in taking over the Presidential post if it becomes vacant before 2010.

“That (Vice President) is the Constitutional successor,” Yano said when asked by reporters here if he supports de Castro in case President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo fails to finish her term by 2010.

“If there’s any vacancy, but there is none,” he added.

Yano will takeover Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) chief of staff Gen. Hermogenes Esperon, Jr. when the latter’s extended term ends on May 9 of this year.

Calls for Arroyo’s resignation mounted this month after Rodolfo Lozada, Jr. bared the alleged irregularities behind the now-cancelled $329-million national broadband network project of the government.

Arroyo, however, is determined to finish her term by 2010.

Yano maintained that the 120,000-strong military will not heed to calls for them to intervene in current efforts to oust Arroyo, and sought instead for the public to take legal means.

“Every group, every individual can have his own perception. And if there are 90 million Filipinos, and we follow the individual perception of each, then we will have chaos,” he said.

Yano said the stand of the military is they are for the “Constitution and the duly Constituted authority, not for any group or individual.”

“If we have laws, let’s follow the rule of law,” he said./DMS