THE Quezon City raid last Thursdays by a joint police-Army team that left three suspected bandits dead came only two days after the bombing on the Batasan complex.
This does not necessarily mean, however, that the operation was staged by the police, especially because it tended to make their efforts to solve the bombing easier.
Until there is proof that the items found in the “safe house” were planted, it would be difficult to set them aside just because they contradicted one’s theory of the bombing.
Those items and the identities of the suspects killed and arrested brought into the glare two entities: former congressman Gerry Salapuddin and Abu Sayyaf bandits.
Salapuddin, Abu Sayyaf
The link to Salapuddin may seem convenient because of the initial police theory that the target of the Batasan bombing was his political rival in Basilan, Wahab Akbar.
But the police have admitted they don’t have anything against Salapuddin yet.
The Abu Sayyaf angle, meanwhile, could weaken police claim that the bombing was not a terrorist act, as it targeted only Akbar and not the House of Representatives.
This development raised, therefore, two more angles aside from the Akbar-was-target line: one, that the bomb was meant both for Akbar and the House and, two, that it was directed at the House and Akbar was only among the unintended victims.
Not solved yet
That one can still mine more angles on the bombing also means that despite the raid probers still have a long way to go before they can be definite about the perpetrators.
It was therefore wrong for National Capital Region Police Office Chief Geary Barias to claim that, with the recent development, the Batasan bombing has been solved.
While the raid and the recovery of important pieces of evidence may have moved the investigation on the bombing forward, it also exposed more loose ends in the case.
Credible closure
Those loose ends need to be tied together before authorities can claim it has solved the case, and closure must be credible considering the magnitude of the attack.
That is an important way to ensure that similar incidents will be prevented from happening in the future.
ld as lumber. The ban on cutting of forest trees in Mindanao had become the death knell of coconut trees in Central and East Visayas.
