Arroyo old defenders are truth body's detractors

Militants need not fret that the atrocities of the Arroyo admin are not among the Truth Commission’s investigative assignments. Even without that special body, an agency is gearing up to solve the hundreds of killings and abductions of student, labor and peasant activists. That agency is none other than the NBI.

New NBI director Magtanggol Gatdula believes that the force should have poked its nose from the start into the systematic slaughter of leftists. Since its inception the NBI has always specialized in investigating crimes too big for the local police to handle. Even with the Constabulary’s parallel Criminal Investigation Service, the NBI took on lurid murders, kidnappings and bank robberies. The Constabulary has since become the National Police, and CIS the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group. Local cops have become crime-scene savvy. These should have impelled the NBI to further upgrade skills and equipment to fight modern-day crimes like narco-trafficking and cyber-fraud. Instead, however, the brass turned to “fighting” vice — nude beerhouse dancers and petty sakla gambling. Meaning, they dropped crime solving in favor of vice racketeering.

All this must change. A retired National Police general, Gatdula intends to lead the NBI back to its old glory as the premiere law enforcement agency. This he will do, he says, by helping career NBI agents find their mission in the new situation. And. of course, no more protection rackets.

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Success has many parents. In the wake of the government’s victory in the lawsuits over the NAIA Terminal-3, a number of peripheral players are claiming credit. But the true heroes are those who gave or risked their lives to free RP from the onerous Piatco-Fraport deal. I already mentioned last Monday assassinated Judge Hendrick Guingoyon, and Assistant Solicitor General Nestor Balloccillo and son; and the nearly slain Atty. Jose Bernas. There are also those who defied death threats and blandishments to testify in Washington and Singapore at their own expense. One of them is Gloria Tan Climaco, who as presidential adviser on flagship projects unearthed the bribery under the Arroyo admin. And there are the silent workers at the Office of the Solicitor General, Jane Yu and Jo Arias, under ex-boss Alfredo Benipayo. Plus a handful of other public servants, and pro bono private lawyers and researchers.

Also Monday I misnamed the RP government counsel who resigned the case midway for health reasons. It was ex-Justice Florentino Feliciano, not Regalado. My apologies for the confusion.

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As expected the noisiest defenders of Gloria Arroyo are the loudest detractors of the Truth Commission to probe her plunder. Their chief claim is that the TC usurps the powers of the regular investigative Ombudsman. Too, that it unconstitutionally springs from mere presidential edict and not congressional enactment. Of course, the critics gloss over their idol Arroyo’s own creation by executive fiat of special probe bodies. It’s not so much because Arroyo ignored the findings of her Feliciano Commission against military corruption and Melo Commission against extrajudicial killings, and hid her Mayuga Commission’s report on poll rigging. They just believe perhaps that Filipinos’ memories are too short.

To their insolence Noynoy Aquino staidly replies that they take their beef to court. The critics should be glad that a President who enjoys an 88-percent trust rating prefers to argue his case in a legal forum. Aquino can opt to use the awesome powers of his office and an 87-percent majority control of the House of Reps to have his way. As Commander-in-Chief he can carry out a military-like gathering of evidence and testimonies. But he is so unlike Arroyo, who despite a 70-percent distrust rating still packed the Judiciary with loyalists, including midnight appointees. In fact, it is because of the dysfunctional Ombudsman and shifty courts that Arroyo left behind why Aquino formed the TC. For Arroyo’s attack dogs to now assail the TC is to force Aquino’s hand into doing something more drastic.

Perhaps Aquino should mull just that. Filipinos voted him into office, with a 42-percent margin against eight contenders, precisely to reform the land. And it starts with sweeping away old messes, including Arroyo allies who partook of plunder.

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Recently I featured a proposal for Customs to use its power of “compulsory acquisition” of fishy imports. The scheme will scare shady brokers from habitually misdeclaring and undervaluing their cargo, the most prevalent form of technical smuggling. Customs will simply buy the goods at the suspiciously low declared value, and auction it off for profit. The technical smuggler loses money and learns his lesson the hard way.

Customs chief Angelito Alvarez says Finance Sec. Cesar Purisima in fact endorses the anti-smuggling ploy. They are just awaiting the release of seed money, and compulsory buying of suspicious shipments will begin.

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 “It is when one is threatened by death that he begins to appreciate the significance of life.” Shafts of Light, Fr. Guido Arguelles, SJ

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