Senators seek ‘inconvenient’ truth in new SAF 44 hearing
BIRD’S EYE VIEW OF KILLING FIELD The flat cornfields of Mamasapano town in Maguindanao province, where 44 commandos of the Philippine National Police Special Action Force were pinned down and killed on Jan. 25 in clashes with Moro rebels, as seen from a hovering drone. REM ZAMORA/INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
Senators expect the truth, no matter how inconvenient, to come out at the reopening next week of the Senate inquiry, with President Aquino’s top security officials in attendance, into the massacre of 44 Special Action Force (SAF) commandos on Jan. 25, 2015.
Presidential Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr. Thursday said Malacañang would “heed the invitation and reply to all pertinent questions that may be asked at the hearing in the interest of transparency and public accountability.”
Invited to the Jan. 27 hearing of the Senate committee on public order and dangerous drugs were Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa Jr., Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin, former Interior Secretary Mar Roxas and Philippine National Police Director General Ricardo Marquez.
Ochoa, chair of the presidential anticrime task force, had skipped inquiries in the Senate and House of Representatives into the tragic SAF raid in Mamasapano, Maguindanao province, that took out international terrorist Zulkifli bin Hir, alias “Marwan,” and ended in the slaughter of the elite SAF troopers.
“The full cooperation by the executive is a welcome development to afford the committee, the public and bereaved families the opportunity to be well-informed on the new matters that Senate Minority Leader Juan Ponce Enrile promised to raise at the hearing,” said Sen. Grace Poe, the committee chair, in a text message Thursday.
Poe said she hopes that with the attendance of the administration officials “there will be a full discussion by all concerned and the committee would be able to completely cover said new matters on the 27th.”
“We all want the same thing, the truth, however painful or inconvenient it may be,” said Sen. Francis Escudero.
Following hearings into the massacre, Poe announced in March last year that her committee had completed its report, which had been signed by 20 senators. The report said that Mr. Aquino was politically responsible for the operation, according to Poe. However, the panel report had not been released to the public or discussed in the plenary. Only a summary of the report was released to reporters.
In calling for the reopening of the inquiry, Enrile said he had evidence to show that President Aquino knew about the Mamasapano operation.
Enrile said Mr. Aquino was on an unannounced visit at nearby Zamboanga City and was monitoring the raid in the area controlled by the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF). He said the President did nothing to stop the slaughter of the commandos at the hands of guerrillas of the MILF and the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters.
In a TV interview Thursday, Sen. Serge Osmeña III said he agreed with the reopening of the Mamasapano inquiry, “otherwise people will say we have something to hide.”
Enrile “is not so irresponsible to ask for a reopening and nothing happens,” Osmeña said. “He said he has evidence and he will present it.”
For Sen. Vicente Sotto III, the Palace cooperation on the new inquiry was a “good sign.”
“It sends a good message of cooperation from the executive department that they are willing to help to finally complete the inquiry,” Sotto said in a text message.
On calls for Poe, a presidential aspirant, to inhibit herself from the hearing for political reasons, Sotto said Poe should participate since she was the committee chair and he believed in her fairness. With a report from Jerry E. Esplanada
