GMA: Heads to roll at PNP

A top intelligence officer of the Philippine National Police has resigned, but a fuming President Arroyo wants that to be just the start of a major shakeup in the PNP following the escape of Fathur Rohman al-Ghozi and two other suspected terrorists yesterday.

In a press briefing at Malacañang, Presidential Spokesman Ignacio Bunye did not discount the possibility that the escape may result in the sacking of PNP chief Director General Hermogenes Ebdane Jr. under the principle of command responsibility.

"At this time, we really leave that to the discretion of the President," Bunye said. "But the (dismissal) order covers those who are immediately in charge of (the escaped prisoners’) custody."

Al-Ghozi, the most senior Jemaah Islamiyah militant jailed in the country, escaped before dawn from the supposedly heavily secured Intelligence Group building at Camp Crame, headquarters of the PNP.

Suspected Abu Sayyaf bomb expert Abdul Mukhim Edris and bandit Meram Abante escaped from the same prison, apparently with Al-Ghozi.

While an investigation into the escape is underway, the PNP detention custodians in charge of Al-Ghozi, Edris and Abante were sacked immediately "without prejudice to the filing of appropriate criminal and administrative charges (against) those responsible," Bunye said.

The President has also ordered that a "general alarm" be put out for the immediate recapture of the fugitives, he said.

Also, "the President has ordered the secretaries of foreign affairs, ujustice and the DILG (Department of the Interior and Local Government) and the heads of the National Intelligence Coordinating Agency (NICA) and Bureau of Immigration to contact their Indonesian counterparts for the purpose of coordinating efforts to recapture Al-Ghozi and the other escapees."

"The President intends to get to the bottom of this and see to it that those responsible are properly sanctioned," Bunye said.

She was informed of Al-Ghozi’s arrest past noon yesterday, after she finished bilateral talks aimed at strengthening the "strategic partnership" between the Philippines and Australia against international terrorism with Australian Prime Minister John Howard.

Ebdane and Interior and Local Government Secretary Jose Lina Jr. were with the President at the bilateral meeting with Howard, where Lina signed a memorandum on cooperation against transnational crimes with Australian Federal Police Commissioner Joseph Keelty.

Lina told The STAR he, the President and Ebdane were at a shabu laboratory busted by police in Merville subdivision, Parañaque City when the news of Al-Ghozi’s escape reached them. "The President was really very angry."

Lina said the escape of the three terrorists would result in the immediate overhaul of the PNP Intelligence Group headed by Chief Superintendent Jesus Versoza, who has tendered his resignation to make way for the probe into the terrorists’ escape. The PNP Intelligence Group was in charge of securing the high-security detention center from which the three terrorists escaped.

The PNP and the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) have begun an intensive manhunt for the fugitives, but no shoot-to-kill or shoot-on-sight order has been issued.

Bunye said the Cabinet Oversight Committee on Internal Security chaired by Executive Secretary Alberto Romulo convened yesterday "as soon as the information was verified. The COCIS took the appropriate action at its level."

Major security breach

Al-Ghozi is the most senior JI member in the custody of Southeast Asia and his escape has raised the terrorism threat across the region, Singapore-based security analyst Rohan Gunaratna said.

Gunaratna, author of the book "Inside al-Qaeda: Global Network of Terror," told AFP Al-Ghozi’s escape "is a major breach of security because he was the most important JI member currently in custody. He is the most experienced, the best-trained and the most well-motivated."

JI is a regional terror organization linked to Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda terror network.

Gunaratna warned that Al-Ghozi, sentenced to 10 to 12 years in prison for illegal possession of explosives, is capable of quickly launching a terrorist attack.

"He is the one man who can put together an operation in such a short time," the security analyst said. "He knows how to purchase weapons, he knows how to put operations together, he knows security."

"It is a very important lesson to other countries that they must not hold JI prisoners under conditions in which they can escape because they are very highly motivated," Gunaratna said.

Al-Ghozi trained with the al-Qaeda in Afghanistan before the US led war there toppled the Taliban regime in 2001, and did surveillance work for planned attacks against western and other targets in Manila and Singapore, he said.

Edris, meanwhile, was also trained in bomb-making by the al-Qaeda, a PNP statement issued last year said.

In the Senate, legislators let out a collective roar of fury over the latest escape.

Frustration

The Department of Justice (DOJ) and a Filipino general assigned to Mindanao have expressed dismay and frustration over Al-Ghozi’s escape.

"We’ve been going through a lot of difficulties just to catch these people and they let them escape just like that. This is too much," said the general, who refused to be named.

Justice Undersecretary Merceditas Gutierrez, told reporters the DOJ has alerted field officials of the BI to be on the watch for Al-Ghozi.

"The arraignment (of Al-Ghozi for the Dec. 30, 2000 bombings) will not proceed without him," State Prosecutor Peter Ong said. "He can’t be tried in absentia because he has yet to be arraigned. There won’t be an arraignment on July 21."

The DOJ last week included Al-Ghozi and seven others as principal accused in the multiple murder, multiple frustrated murder and multiple attempted murder charges it filed before the Manila Regional Trial court against alleged Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) bomber Saifullah "Muklis" Yunos for the bomb attack on the Light Rail Transit (LRT) and other targets in Metro Manila that killed 22 people on Dec. 30, 2000.

Sen. Rodolfo Biazon called Al-Ghozi’s escape a "slap in the face" of the Arroyo administration and the "whole Filipino nation."

In this light, he said, "there must be heads that would roll — with not only administrative, but criminal, sanctions."

Pentagon kidnap gang leader Faisal Marohombsar escaped from the Police Anti-Crime Emergency Response (PACER) team detention center last year, when Ebdane was still PACER chief — just a few days before Ebdane was to take the helm of the PNP. Marohombsar was later killed in a clash with a joint police and military team tasked with hunting him down.

Biazon said the escape of Marohombsar last year was a factor for seeking to sack erring prison custodians and their superiors. "Whoever is in charge of the policies, programs, strategies and infrastructure to prevent a similar escape to that of Marohombsar should be held responsible for the escape of Al-Ghozi and the other terrorists."

Biazon, Senate Majority Leader Loren Legarda and Sens. Francis Pangilinan and Edgardo Angara all said in separate statements that the escape of Al-Ghozi, Edris and Abante is a "big blow" to the government’s and the international community’s anti-terrorism campaign.

Angara wants those responsible for the escape of the terrorists to be punished to fullest extent of the law. "They have placed the entire nation at risk."

He also said the "decent and dedicated men in military and police uniform should not lose time in restoring our people’s sense of safety and security." — With Jose Rodel Clapano, Aurea Calica, AFP