Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo said yesterday her controversial husband would leave the country in an apparent effort to save her embattled presidency amid calls for her resignation over electoral fraud allegations.

Arroyo's husband, lawyer Jose Miguel, has become a liability to her presidency due to widespread allegations of corruption and other irregularities, including recent charges he was receiving kickbacks from illegal gambling operations.

"My husband has volunteered to go abroad," Arroyo said in a forum with businessmen, her voice cracking with emotion.

"My husband has volunteered to remove himself from any situation which will cast doubt on my presidency."

The move was seen as an effort to help ease attacks against Arroyo following an admission she committed an impropriety during hotly contested elections last year, which have caused a political crisis that threatens to bring down her administration.

Pressure on Arroyo to step down further escalated yesterday as the widow of her closest rival in the May 2004 elections joined those demanding her resignation.

"She has done enough damage to our country," said Susan Roces, widow of actor Fernando Poe Junior, who narrowly lost to Arroyo. "She has put our country to shame."

Roces said "the most honorable thing" that Arroyo could do was to resign immediately.

Asked if she will lead civil disobedience to force Arroyo to step down, Roces said, "We will get there. It depends on how hard-headed this president is."

The attacks have began to take its toll on Arroyo and her family.

Arroyo, a 58-year-old US-trained economist, said her family was sacrificing its personal happiness "to allow (her) to serve best as president of (the) country."

"I want to signal to everyone that nothing can stop my administration from implementing ... our reform agenda," she said after announcing her husband's plan to leave the country.

It was not immediately known where Arroyo's husband will go and how long he will stay away from the Philippines.

"As a wife, I'm grateful to my husband for his sacrifice," Arroyo said. "My family will miss him terribly. And I ask you to help pray that we remain strong as a family."

Arroyo's eldest son, Congressman Juan Miguel, has already gone on leave from the House of Representatives after also being accused of receiving payoffs from illegal gambling operators.

Also yesterday, the Philippine Government rejected the call from the opposition for the resignation of President Arroyo for her admission of making call to an election official in the last election.

Presidential adviser on political affairs Gabriel Claudio said in a TV interview with the ABS-CBN that the call to the election officials after the vote counting cannot prove Arroyo's cheating in the election.

On Monday, Arroyo apologized for "a lapse in judgment" when she called an elections official while votes were still being counted in the May 2004 presidential election.

The conversations between Arroyo and the election official, which had been illegally wiretapped, have been in the center of an electoral fraud scandal that has triggered calls for the president's resignation and warnings of coup plots.

Tapes of the controversial conversations between Arroyo and the election official discussing what many believe were efforts to fix the results of the May 2004 vote have been circulating in the Philippines since they were released on June 6.

(China Daily June 30, 2005)