MANILA, Philippines - Standing before the plenary yesterday, Senate Minority Leader Juan Ponce Enrile challenged his colleagues in the name of truth and justice to a debate on the killing of 44 Special Action Force (SAF) commandos in Mamasapano, Maguindanao last Jan. 25.
He said he owes it to the public and each of the slain commandos to help seek justice and expose the truth.
“At the height of the investigations being conducted by different agencies and bodies, including this Senate, the survivors and their dependents had expressed to me their resentment and disenchantment as it seemed to some of them that the death of the SAF 44 was now largely being exploited to serve political ends, some for political propaganda,” he said.
Many of the survivors and their families had related to him their plight when he was on hospital arrest at the Philippine National Police General Hospital, Enrile said.
“I promised the survivors that I would bring up their case to this Senate should I be given the opportunity to return to the Senate in my capacity as a member of this chamber,” he said.
It was only now that he had the chance to tackle the matter on the floor since he returned from detention sometime last month, Enrile said.
“This is why, this afternoon, in accord with my promise to them, I would like to inquire into and know the status of the much publicized Committee Report on the Senate inquiry conducted and concluded on the Mamasapano incident supposedly in aid of legislation,” he said.
After Enrile had spoken, chairman Grace Poe manifested that the committee on public order and dangerous drugs had already submitted its report on the matter, but that Majority Leader Alan Peter Cayetano had not calendared it.
Responding quickly, Cayetano said the matter was not brought for discussion before the plenary because he had a pending request to Poe’s committee to reopen the investigation.
On Enrile’s motion, the Senate leadership agreed to bring the matter to plenary after Congress resumes session on Nov. 3.
The 16th Congress went on break this week.
DOJ report, part 2
The Department of Justice (DOJ) is set to release today the second half of the fact-finding report on the killing of the police commandos.
Prosecutors and the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) have concluded the investigation on the death of nine other commandos in Barangay Pidsandawan, according to Justice Secretary Leila de Lima.
The report will also cover five civilians and 18 Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) fighters who were killed during the fighting, as well as the reported US involvement in the operation, she added.
The DOJ has started preliminary investigation on the criminal charges against 90 MILF commanders and members of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) and private armed groups tagged in the killings.
A panel of prosecutors was formed earlier this week for the preliminary probe on charges of direct assault with murder and theft arising from the first part of the fact-finding report released last April.
The charges will cover the cases of 35 slain commandos from the 55th SAF company that clashed with the MILF and BIFF fighters and other armed groups in the cornfields of Barangay Tukanalipao.
The killing of the SAF commandos appeared to be “spontaneous and not an institutional act of the MILF,” investigators said in the first part of the report.
Rejecting the MILF’s findings, the report said the Mamasapano bloodbath was not a “misencounter.”
“In the team’s appreciation of the facts and available evidence, the incident was not a massacre as graphically described by the Senate nor a simple misencounter as clinically suggested by the MILF. Rather the complicated truth is somewhat in between these two extremes,” the report said.
Among the salient findings was that the 55th SAF company fired the first shot that started the firefight in Tukanalipao, Mamasapano.
“There was a pintakasi by the MILF, BIFF and PAGs (private armed groups) against the 55th SAC. By 8 a.m. of Jan. 25, 2015, the MILF, BIFF and PAGs who fought the 55th SAC members already knew that they were engaged in a firefight with police officers,” the report said.
“Some 55th SAC commandos tried to surrender, but the MILF, BIFF and PAGs continued firing at them until the commandos could no longer fight back because many of them were already dead and those still alive were severely wounded.
“After the firefight, MILF elements crossed the river over to the cornfield to finish off the dying 55th SAC members.” – With Edu Punay