The Philippine government blocked ex-president Gloria Arroyo from leaving the country Tuesday after she dramatically turned up at Manila airport wearing a neck brace, insisting she must face graft charges. President Benigno Aquino’s administration defied a Supreme Court ruling that Arroyo should be allowed to seek medical treatment abroad immediately for what the 64-year-old has said is a life-threatening bone disease. At the end of a tension-filled day of Philippine politics, Arroyo arrived at Manila airport in an ambulance and was escorted into the building in a wheelchair wearing a neck brace, with the events broadcast on television. Justice Secretary Leila de Lima said immigration authorities had been told to stop Arroyo from leaving the country, prompting outrage from the ex-president’s camp. “We have rights enshrined under the constitution, we will fight for our rights,” Arroyo’s spokeswoman Elena Bautista Horn told ABS-CBN television from inside Manila airport as they sought to negotiate with airport officials. The Supreme Court had earlier in the day overturned a government ban imposed last week barring Arroyo from travelling abroad. A spokesman for the Supreme Court said the justices had ruled 8-5 that the ban, which also applied to her husband, was unconstitutional because they had not yet been charged with any crime. “They (Arroyo’s lawyers) were able to show… the (travel ban) would probably work (as) an injustice against them,” spokesman Midas Marquez said. “This was of course consistent with the constitutional presumption of innocence.” However de Lima insisted that the travel ban would remain in place until the government formally received the Supreme Court’s decision.
