More justifications for the siege E

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 RENE GENOVE Bureau Chief, Dumaguete MAJA P. DELY Advertising Coordinator

CARLOS ANTONIO L. LEONARDIA Administrative Officer

Speaking to journalists in Iloilo at a press conference shown on television Wednesday night, Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez appeared to take a different tack in justifying the siege at the capitol of his home province that had shocked both his "kasimanwas" and the entire country last week.

This was when aggressive cops from the Regional Mobile Force in full battle gear, under orders to remove Iloilo Governor Niel Tupas from his office due to an order of the Ombudsman, rushed into the capitol building, smashing glass doors, and with guns obviously cocked, shoved people inside out of the way, pointing their high-powered guns at them, and sending some of them down to the floor.

The ugly affair had been fully covered by TV, whose stations lost no time in showing them to the country that same day. All who saw it then, or in later replays, were both shocked and appalled that such could happen in a city that was not under Martial Rule, or a police state. Some likened the situation to that in Iraq, others claim the cops were acting like Hitler's gestapo. Even the Commission on Human Rights expressed dismay over the incident.

In explaining to the Iloilo media, however, Gonzalez focused more on the offenses committed by the governor which, he said had been judged and meted the penalty of dismissal by the Ombudsman. In effect, he was chiding those who criticized the police and the government for the act, stressing that it showed that they were siding with the ones found guilty of graft. You are always complaining about graft in government, but when they are punished you side with them, he said.

He drew a comparison between sheriffs executing a court order who demolish houses under such orders and insisted that what the cops did was justified.

Somehow, the Secretary seems to miss the point. What had shocked and disgusted the people was not the alleged crimes of Tupas and his fellow officers. They know that judgment is inevitable, but did the cops have to overdo their act? Especially when those inside were not resisting?

That, and not the penalty meted to Tupas et al, are what the protests are all about.*