Thursday, June 26, 2008 Ledesma: Probe? By Jun Ledesma Sunbursts
TUESDAY'S local headline deserves to be posted in the Ripley's book of record. "Body to probe killings in city" took me by surprise in that suddenly from out of the blue a task force surfaced to investigate cases involving murder of Jun Pala, Ferdie Lintuan and militant leader Celso Pojas.
I have nothing against the probe, in fact am endorsing it, but two things bothers me. Lintuan's case is now being litigated and I was made to believe that the respondents are now behind jail. I do not know much about the status of Pojas case but I think that this one is under investigation.
Jun Pala is entirely a different story. This irrepressible radio commentator during his stint in the broadcast went into a lot of troubles earning for himself countless enemies. I personally knew Pala and I can probably claim that I knew up-close who he is. As president of Media Dabaw in the late early 80's I twice personally helped him regain his job as radio anchorman. I also fielded him to run for Mayor versus Zafiro Respicio and Rodrigo Duterte not so much because I believed that Respicio and Duterte were not qualified but because Respicio was not the kind of leader that Davao City deserved.
Pala was hard-hitting, reckless and popular. It came to a point that not even the closest of personal friends, including those in the media, in the business circles and among the politicians who helped him do not matter to him anymore.
Because he became too hot to handle and because he started to forget the unwritten code of friendship, many of those who empathized with him kept distance. Jun Pala was a hunted man. He had enemies from all fronts no one, including himself, knew where his assassin will come from or who will pull the trigger on him. His mistress knew this. Pala basked in the glory of his popularity but unfortunately he threw caution into the air.
The assassin of Jun Pala remained unknown but among the close friends of the indomitable commentator they might know who did him in. But I do not think that they will talk for the saga of Jun after all ended as he had crafted it to be.
But why the sudden concern for Pala when there are living members of media who suffer the cold confines of a prison cell. Why not look after the fate of Alex Adonis, a living dead, who is virtually buried in the hellish detention cell in Dapecol? There is nothing much that can be done to resurrect Pala but there is so much hope to bring Adonis back to life. If the probe team is in earnest to help, they better look after Adonis whose life still pulsates. Then maybe later we can dig up the ashes of Pala's past. Frankly I smelled politics in this probe and that is not a good start.
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By the way, watch for a big development on June 30. I got it from an unimpeachable source that some rich families with Chinese ancestry will have to leave their homes. Which mean they will be evicted from where they stay. Since I do not have the documents with me to verify the veracity of this rumor I will just leave the matter that way -- rumor. Maybe some enterprising journalists can follow this up.
