Who drained the
RSBS of the Army?

Published by the Visayan Daily Star Publications, Inc.

NINFA R. LEONARDIA Editor-in-Chief & President

CARLA P. GOMEZ Editor GUILLERMO TEJIDA III Desk Editor NANETTE L. GUADALQUIVER Busines Editor CEDELF P. TUPAS Sports Editor (On Leave) RENE GENOVE Bureau Chief, Dumaguete MAJA P. DELY Advertising Coordinator

CARLOS ANTONIO L. LEONARDIA Administrative Officer

There had been rumors and there had been rumblings. In fact, among the reasons hinted for the staging of the mutiny by several young officers of the country's military had been their claim that something fishy was going in in the handling of the funds they had been contributing to and supposed to be held for their retirement or separation from the service later.

Once again the saying that where there's smoke, there's fire, has been proven. The Armed Forces itself admitted recently that the Retirement and Separation Benefit System had gone bankrupt, kaput, and could no longer continue to operate. In plain words, there was nothing left in the coffers that once held the millions contributed by the soldiers themselves, deducted from their meager pay.

After the bells had tolled for the Armed Forces of the Philippines Retirement and Separation Benefit System, Malacañang was quick to announce that the officers and soldiers, especially those on the verge of retirement, do not have to worry, because the President was putting up some P26 billion to cover what they expected from the fund.

That may assuage the anxiety, disgust and indignation of the contributors to the fund, but what dismays those who are part of it is the failure of the government, if not their own officials in the military, to act against those who have dipped their dirty fingers into their money and enriched themselves with impunity.

In truth, several cases - almost a hundred of them - had been filed against some of those believed involved in the thievery, but nothing has come out, so far, of those charges. The cases are said to be languishing at the Sandiganbayan.

This is another case that bears watching - not just from the angle of how the courts will act on them, but also, from the side of the soldiers, as to how far their patience and tolerance of such crimes perpetrated on them will go.*