Editorial
ONE MAN in custody, two others still at large, trial yet to begin one year after the crime. That, in a nutshell, is the depressing reality of the case relating to the murder of Italian missionary Fr. Fausto “Pops” Tentorio, who was gunned down outside his convent in Arakan town, North Cotabato, in October last year. Tentorio was shot eight times in the chest by a man who, in a horrifyingly familiar fashion, then calmly walked to a waiting motorcycle and sped away.
ONE MAN in custody, two others still at large, trial yet to begin one year after the crime. That, in a nutshell, is the depressing reality of the case relating to the murder of Italian missionary Fr. Fausto “Pops” Tentorio, who was gunned down outside his convent in Arakan town, North Cotabato, in October last year. Tentorio was shot eight times in the chest by a man who, in a horrifyingly familiar fashion, then calmly walked to a waiting motorcycle and sped away.
The
assassin left behind the lifeless body of a foreign priest who had
chosen to live in the hinterlands of the country since 1978, in the
company of poor and powerless Filipinos whose upliftment Tentorio had
dedicated his life and ministry to. Father Pops became known in the
area as a champion of human rights, an outspoken opponent of
large-scale mining and “a true servant who represents the best of
humanity,” as he was described by those who came in tears after he
fell to a hail of bullets.
Three
months after the murder, a certain Jimmy Ato was captured in Arakan
and identified by authorities as the main suspect in the killing. He
has remained in custody all this time, awaiting trial, while other
suspects, including Ato’s brother and alleged accomplice, are still
at large.
Fr.
Peter Geremia, the assistant parish priest of Arakan and head of the
Justice for Father Pops Movement, noted that as of Oct. 17, the first
anniversary of Tentorio’s killing, there has been no word from the
Department of Justice on the status of the case, except a
conversation Geremia said he had with Justice Undersecretary
Francisco Baraan on Sept. 13. When Geremia followed up the case, he
said Baraan told him: “Sorry, Father, to tell you that the NBI
(National Bureau of Investigation) doubts your witnesses.”
Those
witnesses surfaced in March this year, claiming that the
assassination had been planned by Jan Corbala, also known as
Commander Iring, the leader of a paramilitary group in the area
called the Bagani Tribal Force. In July, however, Geremia decried
what he said was the military’s apparent intent to hinder the case
by refusing to allow NBI agents to enter its camps in North Cotabato
to investigate the Bagani group’s involvement in the case.
That
protest went nowhere; the case at this point is nowhere near
resolution as it was one year ago.
We
have said it many times—President Aquino’s administration, while
it has made encouraging strides in such areas as economic reform, the
fight against corruption and making peace with Islamic insurgents in
Mindanao, might well forfeit all such hard-won gains over the one
basic task it has miserably failed at: law and order.
The
ability of Father Pop’s killers to evade the law with impunity is
not an aberration. It is a continuing, and most damning, affirmation
of the government’s impotence to throw the book at powerful
criminals and well-connected lowlifes who are able to count on the
protection of shadowy forces in society, not to mention the glacial
pace of the justice system, to shun accountability for their crimes.
They
may not be as well-known, but those suspects have now joined a rather
illustrious rogues’ gallery of master escapists like retired major
general Jovito Palparan, still scot-free despite a so-called massive
manhunt against him. Are we to believe that no one in the military
and police communities—for all the billions of pesos of unaudited
intelligence funds lavished on them—have yet any idea where their
erstwhile colleague is, or who might be helping him hide?
Palparan’s
non-capture grows farcical by the minute. So does that of Palawan
governor Joel Reyes and other suspects in the murder of
environmentalist and radio broadcaster Gerry Ortega, with its
bad-novel tale of assumed identities and escorted escapes right
through the Immigration area of the country’s international
airport. Reyes is reportedly in Bangkok under a new name; who knows,
the next time we hear of him he might even have become one of the
city’s famed “ladyboys,” just to elude deportation.
But
he needn’t work too hard, because the Philippine government appears
to be in no hurry to haul him, or Palparan, or the cult leader and
former congressman Ruben Ecleo Jr., or the killers of Father Pops,
before the bar of justice. Mr. Aquino can announce to the world ad
nauseam that it’s morning again in the Philippines, but all that
putative progress won’t matter until the fundamental idea that
crime does not pay becomes, once again, a reality honored in this
country not in the breach but in the observance.
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