Solon wears anti-Con-ass gown for SONA

MANILA - For President Arroyo's State of the Nation Address (SONA), assistant minority leader and Gabriela Rep. Liza Maza donned a P700 beaded gown hand-painted with the President's image and an embroidery of the word Con-Ass. Below the President's image are people strangled by its thread.

Maza's gown, handpainted for free by social realism artist Boy Dominguez, is made of white "katsa" or the cloth used for flour sacks. Maza told reporters the cloth was originally meant to be sewn into a curtain.

The gown is meant to show the real state of the nation, she said. The opposition fears that inspite of public protests, the administration will push for Charter change before the 2010 elections.

"It depicts the reality of Arroyo's unrelenting efforts for term extension through Con-Ass being pushed by her allies in the House of Representatives. Moreover, it shows both the suffering and resistance of the Filipino people to these schemes," Maza said in a statement.

Maza and other opposition party-list representatives said they will stage a walk out before President Arroyo's SONA this afternoon.

The House of Representatives passed last June House Resolution 1109 declaring joing voting as the proper way to convene Congress into a Constituent Assembly and amend the Constitution. This could pave the way for the numerically dominant House of Representatives to complete the necessary 225 votes to convene the assembly without any help from a single senator.

The President is expected to make pronouncements about her administration's plans on Charter change in her SONA on Monday, the ninth and last during her term. The opposition has warned that Charter change is a ploy to extend her term in Malacanang.

In the 2003 visit of then US President George Bush, Maza also wore a shawl with an anti-war message.