In a rare instance of common assent, two of the country’s ruling political leaders rose in unison the other day to pay tribute to what they described as respectable achievements of President Gloria Arroyo in the management of governmental affairs.

Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile, saying “Mrs. Arroyo has outsmarted all other past presidents in terms of performance and accomplishments,” found concurrence in Speaker Prospero Nograles’s statement that “The president did a good job in preparing and implementing an excellent economic program that weathered the worst of the global financial crisis.”

The heads of both the Senate and the House gave their assessments of President Arroyo’s performance ahead of the State of the Nation Address (SoNA) which the president is delivering on Monday amid severe attacks by the opposition and various administration critics.

Ponce Enrile, in a briefing for the Senate media, maintained that except for the persistent allegations of corruption in government, questions about her 2004 presidential election, and issues regarding the waning public trust in her motivations, Arroyo could lay claim to a respectable achievement as President of the Philippines.

The senate president, of course, knows whereof he speaks having been at the forefront of various sensitive positions in government for the longest time, since he was persuaded to enter public service in the 1960s by his friend, the late Rafael M. Salas, who was during his time dubbed as the consummate technocrat.

Salas died of heart failure while serving as Executive Director (with the rank of UN Asst. Secretary General) of the United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA).

Despite the credit he is giving the President, however, the Senate President is not optimistic about claims the Arroyo government could solve the four-decades insurgency problem by 2010.

Ponce Enrile, a former National Defense Secretary, said that may not be possible.

Still, he asserts, Mrs. Arroyo should be applauded for “keeping the country together during all these years.”

He is all praise for President Arroyo’s energy and industry, saying as a president, nobody could match her: She is here and there … everywhere, he said.

In a separate assessment, the President’s allies in the House score her performance as “above par” in the implementation of excellent socio-economic programs that weathered the global financial downturn, without mentioning any specific programs.

“If you talk of working hours, I don’t think any president can beat her,” Nograles said.

Nograles seemed specially impressed by President Arroyo’s presence when she attends international gatherings of various countries’ leaders.

“The President shines,” he mused.

(zhern_218@yahoo.com)