The ‘ruling class’

Coming back from their month-long recess, Senators and House members of the 18th Congress are back in session starting today. The lawmakers have been on break since Oct. 5. However, they have only two months remaining before sessions adjourn anew for their Christmas recess before the year 2019 ends.

Both chambers will have to meet the self-imposed deadline they set within which to approve the proposed P4.1-trillion budget of the national government for next year. Senate President Vicente Sotto III and Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano have previously promised to President Rodrigo Duterte there won’t be a repeat of previous year’s re-enacted budget. 

Given though time constraints, the leaderships of the two chambers are at stake on the timely approval of the budget bill, or the proposed General Appropriations Act (GAA) of 2020. Thus, it would be reasonable to expect the proposed 2020 GAA will take precedence over other more controversial bills and legislative investigations poised on a number of national issues that cropped up during their one-month recess.

Aside from pending bills, a number of investigations “in aid of legislation” will also resume, with new ones that both chambers have yet to deliberate and act on. One of these legislative inquiries left hanging before they adjourned ending on their “Undas” recess is the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee investigations into the so-called “ninja cops” scandal dating back in 2013 when the police raided a shabu den in Pampanga.

Actually, the 2013 “ninja cops” scandal was revived in the course of the ten public hearings of the Senate on the controversial Good Conduct Time Allowance (GCTA) granted to persons deprived of liberty (PDLs) at the New Bilibid Prisons (NBP). The Senate investigation spun off from the illegal drugs trade of certain high-profile PDLs inside the state penitentiary in Muntinlupa City and their cohorts at the Philippine National Police (PNP) called as “ninja cops.”

The monicker “ninja cops” stemmed from their clandestine pilferage of illegal drugs seized from suspects and recycling the evidence and selling them back to the illegal drug trade syndicates. 

It was Sen. Richard Gordon, chairman of the Senate Blue Ribbon committee, who stumbled into this six-year-old “ninja cops” case when an investigation report on it popped up. Acting on this report, Gordon invited former PNP Criminal Investigation and Detection Group Director Benjamin Magalong now Mayor of Baguio City to shed light on this NBP drug trade involving “ninja cops” that he previously investigated.

The case involved police officers in Pampanga led by Police Maj. Rodney Baloyo IV during the raid on Nov. 29, 2013. The police raiders allegedly took away huge amounts of cash, vehicles and over 160 kilos out of the 200 kilos of shabu they seized from the residence of a suspect, identified as Johnson Lee. An internal PNP investigation shortly after the raid also discovered that Lee was freed in exchange for P50 million, and was replaced with a Chinese national, Ding Wengkum, who was presented to the media as the suspected drug trafficker.

Before he could gracefully exit at the mandatory age of retirement on his 55th birthday this Nov. 8, outgoing PNP Director General Oscar Albayalde opted to step down while the re-opened case against him is being reviewed. Effective Oct. 14, Albayalde went on non-duty status at the height of the controversial Senate inquiry into the “ninja cops” case.

Gordon came out already last Oct. 19 with the draft report on their inquiry into the so-called “ninja cops.”

A copy of which was furnished to President Duterte through Senator and concurrent Special Assistant to the President  Christopher “Bong” Go. In his 46-page preliminary report, Gordon accused Albayalde for alleged “monumental cover-up” of this case.

At the time of the raid, Albayalde was still a colonel and Pampanga provincial director, while Baloyo was his intelligence officer. The case against Baloyo and fellow accused police officers, as it turned out later at Gordon’s Senate investigations, never prospered and gathered dusts at the Department of Justice (DOJ).

Albayalde was relieved for “command responsibility,” placed on “floating status” for eight months in 2014 and eventually got reassigned. But as fate would have it, Albayalde’s police career recovered and shone while he was named to head the National Capital Region Command in July 2016.

Thanks to erstwhile PNP chief and now Senator Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa who gave Albayalde the break. It was Bato’s recommendation of Albayalde that President Duterte relied on when the Senator retired from the PNP in April 2018. Bato once served as police chief while the President was still Mayor of Davao City. 

Bato and Albayalde were classmates or “mistah” at the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) Class 1986. Deputy chief for operations Lt.Gen. Archie Francisco Gamboa – another member of the present “ruling class” at the PNP – was named officer-in-charge.  

While observing “Undas” last week at his home in Davao City, President Duterte admitted he might have been blindsided in the “ninja cops” case against Albayalde. When reporters asked about the possible new PNP chief, the former Davao City Mayor disclosed he is still conducting a deep selection background check among the candidates of senior police officials before he makes his final decision.

There is no official word yet neither a Palace hint on who has earned the trust and confidence of President Duterte to become the new PNP chief.  In the final choice, however, anyone worthy enough to earn the Presidential appointment will have to lead the PNP out of the dark shadows left behind by the “ninja cops” scandal that besmirched the last few days of Albayalde as PNP chief.

The new top cop of President Duterte – who would henceforth run the PNP – would again not be just one man under the “ruling class” culture still pervading in both the existing organizations of the police and military in our country.

As usual, the rest of his “mistah” would all become the new “ruling class” at the helm of the PNP.