President Benigno Aquino III’s swan song on Mamasapano, performed at the Philippine National Police Academy, was incomprehensibly silent on many outstanding questions.
Do the unsatisfied 79 percent of Filipinos need to spell it out? He deliberately and obstinately continues to skirt the issue of why he dealt with people who were not supposed to be in the loop, and excluded people who were supposed to be.
Or why did the PNP-Special Action Force intrude into a known territory of a peace partner, armed to the teeth, in the dead of night and then expect a warm hearty welcome?
Or why did the United States know everything about the operation and was practically calling the shots, while all the President’s men and our grandmothers—except suspended PNP chief Alan Purisima and SAF commander Getulio Napeñas—were kept in the dark?
And then when the Nobel Peace Prize he longs to get slipped away, he blamed Mamasapano on a ground commander who was smarter than others, including himself. How could we understand, pray tell?
Pontius Pilate would look unoriginal in washing his hands.
You are not yet off the hook, Mr. President. Legal suits await especially those too proud and in denial to simply say, “Oops, I blew it (again).”
Then we will start to understand.
—EDRE U. OLALIA, secretary general, National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers, nupl2007@gmail.com