We've already left Malacañang, First Gentleman Mike Arroyo says

(Update 7:20 p.m.) First Gentleman Jose Miguel "Mike" Arroyo on Tuesday said he and his family are no longer residing in Malacañang, in time for the change in government on June 30. After the launch of the coffee table books “First" and “181 Dreams" at the Palace, Mr. Arroyo told reporters that the First Family has already returned to their residence inside the La Vista Subdivision in Quezon City on Sunday. The First Family started cleaning out their closets in Malacañang for the last two months, he said. "We have moved out already. We've been packing more than two months ago. We started packing long ago... Our clothes are out already. We already stay in La Vista," he said in a radio interview. The First Gentleman said they have only been returning to the Palace to attend official functions. He said that he and his family were "happy to leave Malacañang" and that he would continue "lying low," out of public and media attention. After his wife, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo steps down, the First Gentleman plans to spend more time with his grandchildren and doing charity work through his First Gentleman Foundation, a charitable institution he founded in 2001 to help poor individuals. The coffee table books launched on Tuesday were about the projects that were carried out by the First Gentleman Foundation and beneficiaries of its Bagong Doktor Para Sa Bayan. ‘It’s very fruitful because we were able to help so many people and this is our project the Doctors to the Barrios Program inspired by (former senator and) Doctor (Juan) Flavier, but aside from this, we have other programs also like what you saw in the video — we had the one for the kidneys; the heart; the eye, the cataract; the kidney; then the bungi the ngebu project — so we have many projects," he said. He admitted feeling that the media had been "unfair" to him and his wife for the last nine years that she was occupying in the highest post in the Philippines, saying the media tended to focus on allegations hurled against the First Family that were not backed up by proof. He is also set to undergo a spine operation on Saturday. Last March, he was rushed to a hospital after suffering from back pains triggered by the re-dissection of his thoracic aorta. Despite Arroyos' departure from the Palace, it remains uncertain who the next occupant would be since President-elect Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino III has insisted on holding office outside Malacañang. Aquino has repeatedly said he wanted to work from his ancestral home along Times Street in Quezon City, where he had started receiving foreign dignitaries. - Mark D. Merueñas/RJAB Jr./LBG, GMANews.TV