Too many investigations

You’ve heard the expression, the fog of war. When there’s a battle being waged, or a war being fought, there’s a point where everything deteriorates into bedlam, confusion, blood and gore, and perspectives are obscured by the acrid smoke of combat.

What we’re experiencing today, with so many wanna-publicity-types, including senators and congressmen, trying to elbow themselves into the limelight by publicly "inquiring" into why the Oakwood Mutiny took place last July 27, and going through the motions of trying to unmask the masterminds, financiers, backers and co-conspirators who weren’t at Oakwood, is the "fog of yackety-yak".

Too many investigations – six at last count – going on at the same time already have everybody in a state of exhaustion, confusion, and paranoia, with no end in sight to all the grandstanding, finger-pointing, obscurantism, and out-and-out histrionics.

We’ve got, of course, the independent commission chaired by retired Supreme Court Justice Florentino Feliciano, which is probably the most valid forum for uncovering the "facts" about the failed mutiny, or putsch, whatever you may call it, but got off to a shaky start yesterday. The Fact-Finders did their best to appear impartial, which is right, although at one point their Chairman did begin to lecture one of the mutineers in the dock, Scout Ranger Capt. Milo Maestrecampo. Feliciano, it can be said, tried to keep the question-and-answer sessions on an even keel, which cannot be said of lawyer Mario Ongkiko, who snarled at and badgered Maestrecampo in the afternoon session, as if he were the Chief Inquisitor of the Spanish Inquisition and Maestrecampo were some heretic bound for burning at the stake. Susmariosep, Ongkiko even dragged the veterans of Bataan into the argument – where did that come from? – provoking the verbally battered and already punch-drunk-looking Maestrecampo to blink and piteously ask what Bataan ("which was a long time ago") had to do with Oakwood.

Indeed, why drag in the "failure of the Bataan defenders to defend Bataan" as a defense for the "failure" of Intelligence Chief (ISAFP) Brig. Gen. Victor Corpus, Attorney Ongkiko? Sanamagan, like the attorney’s brother (whom he also dragged into yesterday’s discussion), my father was a failed defender of Bataan – so, indeed, they lost to the Japanese – and it’s disgusting that he and his comrades should by some legal acrobatics be shoehorned into this silly debate. Why, Attorney Ongkiko, are you suddenly sounding like the defense lawyer of General Corpus? That’s the way it appeared yesterday, on television.

I am really mystified, and I guess many are, about the role somebody like Ongkiko (UP Law ’56) is playing in the Feliciano Fact-Finding Commission – an independent commission created by President Macapagal-Arroyo to get to the bottom of the Oakwood Affair. Is Ongkiko, one of the country’s high-profile trial lawyers (for instance, he was the lawyer of Hubert Webb in the Vizconde Rape and Massacre Case), assigned to be a Prosecutor in the Fact-Finding Commission, to try – some said yesterday "fry" – the mutineers testifying at the Camp Aguinaldo Clubhouse? The way he subjected Maestrecampo to a "cross" (cross-examination) converted a simple hearing into a court room drama with the befuddled Ranger Captain seeming to be already on trial for his life.

This is not a brief for Maestrecampo (who’ll have to face the consequences of his acts in a proper Court Martial) or Navy Lt. Senior Grade Antonio Trillanes IV – who, earlier, made quite a number of sweeping allegations which were quickly denied by Malacañang in a snap press conference. They will be tried in the proper venue. However, yesterday’s session was supposed to be fact-finding session. Today’s hearings in the same place, with other mutineers summoned to testify, shouldn’t be turned into a circus. At least it can be said that the Oakwood putschists are not being gagged. In fact, their "charges" – even those wild or otherwise – are being given maximum publicity. As for Atty. Ongkiko, playing lawyer games simply won’t do.

The viewing public, on the other hand, was reminded yesterday, I suspect, of what the English bard, William Shakespeare, said in one of his most famous plays: "First, let’s kill all the lawyers!"

Eight years of combat experience, most of them in Mindanao, obviously didn’t prepare poor Captain Maestrecampo for somebody like the lawyer who so persistently browbeat him at that hearing. The Ranger Captain had asserted, not for the first time, that he had absolutely refused to do it himself, or order any of his men, to throw hand grenades into a Mosque in Davao. (He didn’t reveal who among his superiors gave that supposed order to him.)

I suggest nobody should be so rash or foolish as to put a grenade in his hand today. There’s little doubt in which direction he’ll throw it.

* * *

Senator Gregorio "Gringo" Honasan, who’s gone into hiding, rang up ABS-CBN’s "TV Patrol" to assert that the photographs purportedly showing somebody who looks like him attending a Magdalo mutineers’ meeting – specifically billed as the "blood compact" thing – are spurious.

Honasan, a veteran putschist in the old Cory days, angrily denied being the man in the photograph, wherever that might have been taken. He denied having presided over or participated in any of that blood-letting, and offered, on the prodding of the host and commentator, Korina Sanchez, to demonstrate that he had no knife scars or cuts to indicate he had "shed" blood to stain that so-called flag as a sign of determination.

In sum, Honasan argued he had never incited or participated in any such conspiracy, and the scars he had on his body were from bullet wounds incurred in battle.

So what about those photos being exhibited by Col. Delfin Bangit of the Presidential Security Group (PSG)?

Oh, well. Whether Honasan is guilty or not, or whether he was the "kuya" mentioned (they’re also trying to pin this on Erap via the Laarni Enriquez route), will come out in the end – hopefully. But, in this day and age when anything can be computer-managed, photos don’t have the same evidentiary value they used to have, when, even in the Kodak Box-Brownie era or the later Polaroid stage, they weren’t that convincing a piece of evidence. To paraphrase Sherlock Holmes (whose sleuthing was done during the time of daguerrotypes), it’s not so elementary, My Dear Watson.

Salamabit: The government is further attempting to "show" that the damning photos – of the purported blood-letting ceremony – were taken in the unoccupied house of former Deputy Executive Secretary Ramon "Eki" Cardenas on Paraiso street, Dasmariñas Village, Makati.

On the strength of much rebel paraphernalia, like four automatic rifles, armbands, backpacks, ammunition, etc. having allegedly been found by a Police-NBI raiding team inside that house, Cardeñas was paraded in a yellow T-shirt identifying him as an NBI "Detainee" which was published in all the local media, and in the international media as well as on every TV cable network and on the front pages of even The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, etc. And he hadn’t even been charged at the time, or arraigned in court! He was disgraced even before prima facie evidence had been confirmed. Was this right?

It’s no wonder Honasan won’t surrender. Probably he’s publicity shy – particularly publicity designed to make him appear "guilty" by way of photo opportunity. Imagine Gringo being snapped in Detainee T-shirt and handcuffs?

I think this is a time to pull back from the brink of hysterical "revelations" and accusations on both sides. We’ve got to get our bearings, and strive to restore a spirit of calm and sobriety to the situation.

It’s time, for that matter, to get back to work.

During all this rebel-chasing, admittedly a necessary task, the kidnappers, murderers, drug-pushers and assorted criminal syndicates have been going full blast. Fighting dangers to our Republic must not take precedence, no matter how we in media and many in the public may enjoy the drama and the spectacle over fighting the everyday perils that threaten our citizens in the streets and in their homes.

This is where the true battle-line exists.

* * *

An important bit of news surfaced abroad yesterday and is likely to be overlooked here owing to our obsession with domestic scandals, such as the announcement that President GMA is cracking down on corruption in the military by directing an examination of the lifestyles of generals, admirals, and other ranking officers. (To be sure, if GMA means business, such as "check" is overdue. One – would you believe?– "lumber" company in Cavite gifted several ranking officers – many of them now retired – with houses in return for "conversion" and ghost-delivery contracts, an insider remarked to me only yesterday. This alleged lavish dispensing of gifts may indeed rival the excitement over Defense Secretary Angelo Reyes’ now-in-the-limelight P10 million residence).

Back to the overseas report: a Belgian court last Tuesday sentenced an Albanian "human trafficker" (who hears a British passport himself) to eight years in jail for having smuggled thousands of Albanians into Britain over the past two years. The estimate is that this guy and his group had successfully smuggled between 8,000 to 10,000 illegal aliens (presumably most of them Muslim Albanians) into Britain! The gang was tracked down and "neutralized" last February by Belgian, British and Dutch police agencies working together to smash this fantastic racket.

Can you imagine how many thousands of illegals, mostly Chinese (as well as Indians and South Koreans), have been smuggled into this country over the past few years?

Britain is supposed to be much tougher in guarding its airports and ports of entry than we are. Yet, this bozo now in prison still managed to get 8,000 to 10,000 illegals into the British Isles. Since he and his bunch weren’t, surely, the only syndicates trafficking in sneaking hordes of illegals into Britain, you can imagine the extent of the nightmare with which the Brits are now grappling. Before you know it, one might quip, Britain may be joining the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), and Sharia law might eventually be imposed on that "gem set in a silver sea".

In our archipelago, we leak like a sieve. We can’t keep people from coming in. We can’t even keep terrorists, druglords, and other crooks and convicts in jail. We have to wise up and get serious now. Tomorrow will be too late. Sus, even today may be too late.