‘Because we killed an innocent man’

Because we killed an innocent man.” The straightforward admission was the kind to reverberate across the universe as if crying out for retribution and restitution, remorseful as if begging for redemption. If this were a Greek tragedy playing out in an amphitheater, there would follow silence so electric, then the tolling of bells and a chorus of weeping and lamentations.

A famous line from Sophocles: “Who is the victim, who the slayer?”

That was how it was in my imagination. But in the here and now in this woebegone country, in a crowded room in the House of Representatives, a clash of nerves was playing out between inquisitors (the House’s quad committee) and persons of interest. Behold them in their everyday office clothes and police uniforms while sipping water from plastic bottles and, every now and then, consulting their greasy cell phones. Here was true-to-life theater where questions and answers were stuff for courtroom dramas and the subject matter for crime thrillers in paperback.

While watching the quad committee drama live, my thought balloon beamed Jesuit Fr. Albert Alejo’s poem “Sanayan Lang Ang Pagpatay.” Its god-awful translation: getting used to committing murder. The quad committee was hearing testimonies on murders most foul planned by persons in government positions and carried out by police elements and their hired men.

The Inquirer’s banner story last Saturday: “Garma behind PCSO exec’s slay, narc tells House” by Krixia Subingsubing. Our headline composer must have had a hard time putting it all in one blow to fit the allotted space. Garma is Royina Garma, a police regional commander who retired early then appointed by then President Rodrigo Duterte (he whose middle name is IWKY) as general manager of the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO). The slain “PCSO exec” was Wesley Barayuga. The “narc” is narcotics officer Lt. Col. Santie Mendoza. “House” refers to the quad committee.

According to Mendoza, the hit job order from Garma was relayed to him by National Police Commissioner Edilberto Leonardo. Both Garma and Leonardo had been implicated in the murder of three Chinese drug convicts at the Davao Prison and Penal Farm.

Wonder no more why the ambush-murder of Barayuga that happened two years ago had, for so long, yielded no suspects. Because it was carried out in Mandaluyong City as planned? What’s with Mandaluyong’s police? When ambushed, the target was aboard a service vehicle specially provided him so that it could be easily spotted. Barayuga was in the crosshairs. It all seemed to be the perfect crime. But as the saying goes, there is no such thing as a perfect crime. In time, the truth will be laid bare.

And so it was at the quad committee hearing that Mendoza, himself a participant in the murder plot, exploded his narrative with his answer to Rep. Gerville Luistro’s follow-up question “Why do you believe that this job ruined your life?” Mendoza’s answer: “Because we killed an innocent man.”

Innocent because Barayuga’s name was included—purposefully and premeditatedly—in a drug list, a hit list, for him to be neutralized like the tens of thousands in the roster of extrajudicial killings during the Duterte presidency. There was no stopping Duterte’s drug-driven war that turned out to be one big smokescreen for other high crimes. Or so they say. Now Barayuga’s confreres are attesting to his innocence, drug-wise, that is, and his fault was in knowing too much about PCSO goings-on and about Garma herself. Or was that all? Where, higher than Garma, did the inspiration to kill Barayuga come from?

On the other side of town, the Senate continues its own investigations of Philippine offshore gaming operators (Pogo)-related crimes of torture, murder, kidnapping, human trafficking, drug dealing, falsification of documents, money laundering and spying. Pogos had their heydays under Duterte. The Chinese nationals who ran Pogos are now reaping the whirlwind and so are their Filipino enablers.

I do not want to see dismissed Bamban, Tarlac mayor Alice Guo, aka Chinese citizen Guo Hua Ping, become a state witness to rat on her coconspirators in Pogo crimes and be let off the hook. The billionaire fugitive who fled and was arrested in Indonesia does not deserve a state witness status. She is not the least guilty, she is not a victim as she now portrays herself to be.

I’ve heard some folks say that watching the live-streamed Senate and House hearings have become “entertainment” for them like crime and spy thrillers are, more entertaining than the star-studded shows and telenovelas. Many are glued to their screens and at the edge of their seats. But at the end of the awareness-raising telethon, fatigue and skepticism set in. Will things get better? Will voters be wiser? What about the high and mighty who got away? Who will protect those who have confessed the truth despite the opprobrium and the pain of a “ruined life”?

When the above cases reach the courts of law, folks will look forward to the next live “entertainment.” Justice being served is another story.

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