Why would any man put his neck on the line to save the hide of another? Out of love, as in a parent for a child? Or out of a sense of higher duty, as in running interference for a leader committed to a lofty cause? Whichever the reason, it is difficult to understand why retired Philippine National Police comptroller Eliseo de la Paz would declare: ?I have to take responsibility for my actions. I can?t blame somebody else. That is my responsibility.?

De la Paz was stopped by Russian customs authorities at the Moscow International Airport for carrying 105,000 euros that exceeded Russia?s allowable limit of a mere $3,000. He was part of an eight-member PNP delegation to the 77th Interpol General Assembly in St. Petersburg.

De la Paz absolved his superiors, PNP Director General Jesus Verzosa and Interior and Local Government Secretary Ronaldo Puno. So who approved the release of the P6.9 million for the group? De la Paz in his capacity as comptroller. Who received that amount? De la Paz did in his new capacity as ?special disbursement officer.? His own PNP colleagues sold him out and told the Senate that he violated PNP regulations when he acted as the requesting, approving and disbursing officer.

Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago asked: ?Your own office ? is saying that you are guilty of violating applicable laws when you ordered, and verbally at that, the release of [P6.9 million]. Do you agree or not?? ?I agree your honor,? De la Paz said.

Next, he explained that the P6.9 million was for ?contingencies? and another P2.1 million for actual travel expenses, but that they sourced it not from their program travel allocation, but from their intelligence fund because the money from the program travel allocation was not yet available?malversation of public funds, as the Inquirer?s Thursday editorial points out.

Then he explained that the P6.9 million was supposed to serve as a ?contingency fund? for any emergencies faced by the delegation. Santiago asked Commission on Audit (COA) Chair Reynaldo Villar if De la Paz could carry a contingency fund in a foreign trip. He replied: ?I don?t think that?s allowed.?

De la Paz was next confronted with the astronomical amounts. The P6.9 million amounted to almost P1 million for each of the eight PNP officials. Asked why the sum was so big, he explained that it was actually meant to buy ?prototype? and ?software? of intelligence equipment in Moscow. Yet, Sen. Rodolfo Biazon, himself former Armed Forces chief, was curious: Why was nobody from the end-user offices, the intelligence agencies, in the delegation?

And how was the P6.9 million given to De la Paz? In cold cash?in P1,000 bills! Asked by Sen. Aquilino Pimentel Jr. why a check covering the amount was not issued, De la Paz said, incredibly: ?There was no check for it.? Indeed, he held an additional 45,000 euros in cash, supposedly given to him by businessman Tyrone Ng Arejola to buy two expensive Swiss wristwatches.

Now that the Russians have in the meantime confiscated the 105,000 euros for being in violation of Russian laws, De la Paz declares that he is willing to reimburse that sum from his own pocket, indeed to eat into his retirement lump-sum for that purpose.

Finally, apprised by the central bank that he violated Philippine law by failing to declare to Philippine customs that he was transporting foreign currency exceeding $10,000, De la Paz merely took the Fifth. He maintained that he was willing to go to prison for his mistake.

An exasperated Santiago said: ?That?s very heroic. You are assuming all guilt. But I have to tell you as a lawyer and a former trial judge that you are facing a regular sentence of 20 years or more than that. Are you ready to do that? Go to jail 20 years, leave your wife your child, your vision-impaired child, just so other people can be free??

The usual explanation is cost-benefit rationality. Imagine Eliseo de la Paz?s inner dialogue. If I rat on my boss and the Boss of all Bosses, my life and that of my family will be in danger. For the rest of my life, I will have constantly to look over my shoulder. (Short of death, they can freeze his pension, block his post-retirement sinecure, and even implead his wife in future prosecutions.) So why play the hero when I will end up as just another statistic? My death will be tomorrow?s headline?and the next day I will be yesterday?s news. Why stand up for a people who will not remember my sacrifice?

On the other hand, if I play the fall guy, if I agree to be the scapegoat and take the flak for bounties that were enjoyed by many others, what do I get? Surely a commensurate bounty for my sacrifice, since the beneficiaries of my sacrifice will happily pay up. They will say ?thank you? not in flowery speeches but in hard cash, in euros and cents. My family will be ?provided for.? Even better, my bosses can actually make it possible for me to avoid prosecution. Delay the case until a forgetful public forgets. (Who remembers the former Armed Forces comptroller Maj. Gen. Carlos Garcia and his wife?s similar experience with US customs?)

Jun Lozada faced that dilemma in early 2007, and he decided differently. It wasn?t that his cost-benefit calculus yielded the opposite result. Even after he had been kidnapped at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport and rode in the same car with his potential gravediggers, and even after the nuns had embraced him in the sanctuary of their convent, he seemed still unsure which path he would take.

The difference, I venture, lies not in a change of mind that outsiders can eternally analyze, but in a change of heart, wherein each man draws the line beyond which any act of self-preservation will leave no self dignified enough to preserve.

* * *

Comments to passionforreason@gmail.com