Godofredo M. Roperos

October 19, 2004
Beyond patience

LET’S put it this way. The long and tedious process of our justice system is one that erodes our patience in the long run. There are cases that even the most indifferent among us can no longer stand, what with the way these are moving.

Often, such cases involve crimes against person. In Cebu, the most prominent is the Ruben Ecleo case, which has left a trail of blood while in litigation for three years.

This is one case that has affected even the most emotionally staid among us. Abetted, in a manner of speaking, by the slow pace of our judicial process, undue killings were perpetrated.

Yesterday afternoon, I saw the city’s lawyers band together in a show of force against the killing of one of them. A streamer proclaimed that lawyers cannot be held hostage by terrorists.

The suspected killer of lawyer Arbet Sta. Ana-Yongco is reportedly a member of a religious group whose leader stands accused of murdering his medical-student wife in cold blood a couple of years back but whose trial for the dastardly act has dragged on for months now.

Indeed, Ecleo’s having been able to post bail for a crime that is said to be not “bailable” is an instance of a situation that sort of stretches the patience of the average citizen. It exasperates not only our sense of justice but also pushes our human impulse to be fair toward the brink.

In fact, it is this feeling of having transcended an imaginary line beyond patience that makes some of us go for the so-called “salvaging” that certain units of our law enforcers are sometimes accused of.

Then there is the long-standing dilemma over the violence reportedly perpetrated by the feuding fraternities. The staid and peace-loving citizens are getting impatient over what appears as the inability of our police to contain the violence that frat members are inflicting on one another.

It is as if they have now a free run of our society so that they are able to do what they wish to with impunity because our laws have become inutile. Recently, a police trainee was killed by fratmen.

It seems our law enforcers have already been driven by their inability to contain the frat members’ violence beyond the limits of their patience, so that they would rather let the feud go unabated in the hope that each group would annihilate each other at no cost to the police, or the government.

That would be very neat, indeed, a sort of community self-cleansing, if you ask me. But that would set a bad example, since our police would be reneging on their duty.

And of course, there are still a host of other cases that are so trying to our patience we do not know how we would ever be able to contain our umbrage for the way they are being processed in our judicial system.

There is that Nodalo case that only the other week, if my septuagenarian mind has not failed me, had Nodalo again able to post bail. Such tales truly shorten our patience, even when you try to be indifferent. Your rage goes beyond your patience.

Finally, there are the drug cases that appear to parade before our eyes as they are moved from the police to the prosecutors’ offices, and then to the courts. The court battles are set. And then, out of the blue, the culprits in custody are set free.

As one police officer told me, we arrest them today, and they are back on the streets tomorrow. Whose temper wouldn’t go beyond patience, pray tell? Mine, yes, mine for one.

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