The formula had worked in 2001, when the movie actor-president Joseph
Estrada was deposed by a four-day uprising in Manila. But Gloria Macapagal-
Arroyo, who took over the presidency after Estrada’s fall, moved quickly to
frustrate attempts in 2006 to oust her. She got the armed forces top brass on
her side and declared a state of emergency on the morning that rebel soldiers
and their civilian sympathizers were to march from their camps to the People
Power monument on Edsa, the avenue where the anti-Marcos uprising had
taken place.
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