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Tuesday, June 26, 2007
3 whistleblower-generals urged to come out
MANILA -- A military official and an opposition senator on Monday challenged three supposed generals to come out in the open and prove allegations that the killing of leftist militants has become military policy.
Armed Forces of the Philippines public information officer Bartolome Bacarro said such allegations should have been made following procedures within the military establishment.
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Bacarro said the alleged generals have the option of presenting their story through the chain of command, directly to the military leadership, or using a grievance mechanism where officers report their complaints to their immediate superiors.
"We are encouraging that they come out. Until these stories have a face, it will remain as allegations," said Bacarro, referring to the accusations of the three generals that the promotion of officers is based on the number of leftist militants they kill.
Bacarro said the generals, who have vowed to help senator-elect Antonio Trillanes IV if he pursues an investigation into the extrajudicial killings, should not fear for their safety if they are indeed military generals.
He said if the generals were still in active service, they could be held liable for making statements that are damaging to the 120,000-strong military establishment.
Bacarro said the military, however, has no jurisdiction over the three generals if they had already retired from the service or are civilians masquerading as military generals.
Senator Rodolfo Biazon also challenged the three generals to come out.
"They should do a Gudani/Balutan act," said Biazon, chairman of the Senate committee on defense and security. He was referring to retired General Francisco Gudani and Colonel Alexander Balutan of the Philippine Marines, who both testified in the Senate in October 2005 on alleged electoral fraud that happened in Maguindanao in the 2004 elections.
"If these three generals love the AFP and their country, they must come out in the open and provide the necessary information that will allow the government to adopt corrective measures. The executive department must come out and conduct an honest to goodness prosecution of the issue. The legislative must explore legislation like putting a legal definition to the principle of command responsibility. The judiciary must of course ensure credible prosecution of any wrongdoing that may be established," Biazon said.
In Malacañang, National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales said Sunday it is high time that the different branches of government take an interest in solving and preventing further occurrences of extrajudicial killings in the country.
Gonzales said the executive branch welcomes the plan of the Supreme Court (SC) to hold a summit on political killings.
SC Chief Justice Reynato Puno said they are planning to hold a summit on political killings for the purpose of reviewing and possibly rewriting Philippine legal procedures to make them more helpful to the victims, more forceful against suspected perpetrators, and more demanding of government agents assigned to solve cases.
Puno said the multi-sectoral summit could be held in July to gather inputs on how the judiciary could fully use its "expanded powers" under the Constitution as a guardian of civil liberties and to address the problem of political killings.
Press Secretary Ignacio Bunye, for his part, said Malacañang has a clear policy against "cold-blooded murder" and stressed that efforts to solve the extrajudicial killings in the country had been relentless.
Bunye said the murders have no place in a democratic country like the Philippines and the administration condemns them in the strongest sense.
He also said they expect the SC-led summit on extrajudicial killings to accelerate the solution of some of the cases and they are enjoining everyone to cooperate and to participate in the upcoming summit.
Malacañang earlier asked the SC to create special courts to handle, solve, and prevent extrajudicial killing cases that have victimized several activists, journalists, and politicians.
The executive branch also invited the international community to assist the country in its efforts on the killings. The last group to arrive was the six-man team of the European Union Needs Assessment Mission, which is staying here until June 28 to assess the current strategies and policies of the agencies involved in the resolution of extrajudicial killings.
Since its arrival last June 18, the EU Mission had already been briefed by the Presidential Human Rights Committee on the strategic work plan of the administration concerning the killings.
The mission also met with the police, National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) and the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) and discussed methods, challenges, and needs in investigating the killings.
The mission also went to the Department of Justice (DOJ) and to the Office of the Ombudsman where they talked about how the prosecution of the suspect might be strengthened and expedited.
Local Government Secretary Ronaldo Puno had briefed the mission on the special courts designated to try political and media killings.
Butuan Bishop Juan de Dios Pueblos said the best way to end the extrajudicial killings is for President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to declare "no to killing".
"If the President just makes a statement - no to killings anymore and that the military will humbly or whatever execute that (order from the President). I do believe that would end all kinds of killings," Pueblos said.
Pueblos was a member of the Melo Commission headed by former SC associate justice Jose Melo. The commission was formed by the Arroyo administration to look into the killings. He resigned from the commission to focus on the parochial work. (VR/CPB/MSN/JMR/Sunnex)
For more Philippine news, visit Sun.Star Cebu. (June 26, 2007 issue)
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One dead; cop, 3 others hurt in group fight