Learning lessons from the Mumbai incident

What a strange ending to the political protests plaguing Thailand, especially after the protesters from the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) stormed the Suvarnabhumi International Airport and the Don Muang Airport in Bangkok. This time, it was the Thai Supreme Court that literally scrapped the People's Power Party (PPP) of Thai Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat for electoral fraud and the High Court banned him from entering in politics for five-years. This officially ends the political problems of Thailand… or is it just beginning to get worse… we can't yet tell.

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Call it an uncanny coincidence, that last Nov.9th was the first anniversary of the Manila Peninsula Siege that comical misadventure that proved how immature Filipinos are especially when the ignorant electorate elected Sen. Antonio Trillanes into office despite the fact that the poor misguided fellow couldn't even get out of detention in order to campaign. But like what most pundits agree on, the Manila Penn Siege will go down in our political history as the last "coup attempt" against the Arroyo Administration.

But while the scenarios were a bit similar, the massacre in Mumbai, especially at the fabulous Oberoi and Taj Mahal Hotels were very violent and bloody and in its aftermath, the Indian people are asking for the resignations of top government agencies that could have prevented that bloody incident. There were many resignations alright, proof that Indian government officials still have some delicadeza left, while not a single Filipino official resigned in the aftermath of either the equally infamous Oakwood Mutiny, (which also took a luxury hotel) or the Manila Penn Siege.

So the big question in many people's mind is, whether the Mumbai incident could have been prevented? Gauging from the CNN interview of India's richest man, Ratan Tata of the Tata Group that owns the Taj Mahal Hotel, he openly declared that they were warned of a possible incident. Now whether the warning was specific, we don't know. But we know that the US government mentioned of a possible attack coming from the sea, which in this case really happened. Now whether this scenario can also happen in Cebu, we can only say… God forbid!

One thing that Mr. Tata mentioned that struck me was that, that incident couldn't have been prevented simply because the security arrangements for all their hotels are always on the front or main door of the hotel. This is also being practiced here. But the terrorists didn't pass through the main doors, but the back door, where security was very light. But more importantly, they entered the back door with guns blazing, so even if the security people were on the alert, no one was prepared for a full-blown attack.

Although I submit that it is difficult if not impossible to thwart a determined attacker, however it should not deter us from preparing for such an eventuality. I just hope that the Philippine National Police (PNP) or the Philippine Military are learning lessons from this incident and coming up with some kind of template on how to stop this kind of terrorism. They can start by asking all the hotel owners in Cebu for their floor plans, so they can see where are the various exits or entry points into the building.

I'm not saying that doing this is going to prevent future incidents from happening. Let me just say that it is better to prepare for such eventualities than not do anything at all. We must learn some lessons on this case.

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I was deep in work when just 70-meters away from my office; a daring armed robbery was taking place at a Jewelry Store inside the Mango Square Mall, which is literally a stone's from my office. There is no doubt that we have dangerous robbers roaming freely in our city, searching for shops to plunder. That the getaway vehicle they used was dumped at the corner of Juana Osmeña and Maria Cristina Extension should give police investigators an idea where these robbers went. Possibly, they had another getaway car which they used after they dumped the stolen Nissan Sentra.

What we need from the Philippine National Police (PNP) is more intelligence gathering, so they would be able to find out who were these robbers. Another thing to look into is whether or not the Jewelry store can identify the stolen pieces. We are a nation with a Culture of No-Shame and people without their conscience bothering them buy stolen goods and sell them as if they owned it legitimately. This is what is known as "fencing". But how many people have been caught, much less charged for this crime? I don't know, just ask your nearest sidewalk "fence" in downtown Cebu City and you'll know that they are operating with impunity. We can only wish the police good luck in their search for these crooks!