PRESIDENT Benigno Aquino III must undergo a psychiatric test to prove he is mentally balanced to lead the country, Negros Occidental Rep. Ignacio Arroyo said Sunday.

Mr. Aquino’s actuations during and after last week’s hostage crisis were abnormal and unbecoming of a head of state, Arroyo said in a statement.

“Must we wait for a bigger and bloodier tragedy, and a more damning humiliation, before we find out for sure if our President is mentally fit to run the country?” he said.

“If he is and has nothing to worry about, then there is no reason for him not to prove his sanity this time unlike during the election campaign.”

Eight Hong Kong tourists were killed in Manila on Aug. 23 after a dismissed policeman hijacked their tourist bus and then fired on them.

Officials later agreed that a police team ordered to negotiate with the gunman botched their job, resulting in the killings. It also appeared that no one had been in control of the situation.

Arroyo said any normal human being would not smile when visiting the place where innocent people had been killed.

“But Mr. Aquino did just that, as we all saw on television, as if the massacre had been a joke perpetrated by a naughty boy deprived of his candy bar,” Arroyo said.

He said Mr. Aquino’s insensitivity was again highlighted when he refused to talk to Hong Kong Chief Executive Donald Tsang at the height of the crisis.

“He treated Mr. Tsang like an ordinary caller,” he said.

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(Published in the Manila Standard Today newspaper on 2010/august/30.)