ALL the noises being made about President Aquinoâs role in the Mamasapano tragedy may be likened to Macbethâs frustrated commentary on life: âFull of sound and fury, signifying nothing.â
While the public may have already decided that Aquino is, to a lesser or greater degree, responsible, accountable and culpable for the tragic fate of 44 PNP Special Action Force commandoes, he appears to have already made up his mind that the most he will acknowledge is âsome responsibility,â but he will not accept any blame. It seems that nothing anyone says or does can change that.
The report of the PNP Board of Inquiry has already been challenged by Malacañang apologists who have already absolved Aquino. Senator Grace Poe, who chaired the Senate inquiry on the tragedy, is caught between a rock and a hard place. If her report pins the blame on Aquino, she will incur his ire, along with the corresponding consequences. On the other hand, if she spares Aquino, her credibility will hit the rocks.
Meanwhile, Aquinoâs detractors do not appear ready to do anything more drastic than demanding his resignation and making veiled threats, choosing instead to wait for âsomeone elseâ to light the fuse and start the fireworks.
Thus, Aquino will undoubtedly finish his term of office, and all the sound and the fury will soon fade or will be superseded by another major scandal.
The best we can do is to dissect the tragic incident as an intellectual exercise, useful for social media postings and dinner table debates.
For starters, I think it helps to understand the distinction between responsibility, accountability and culpability, which are terms being tossed around like a ball, while being loosely defined and used to mean the same thing.
Being âresponsibleâ means being the one in charge. Being âaccountableâ means being answerable to someone else. And being âculpableâ means being at fault.
Malacañang has gone as far as acknowledging Aquinoâs âresponsibilityâ but rejects the accusation of âculpabilityâ which Presidential spokesman Sonny Coloma defines as âa willful intent to commit an unlawful act.â
Justice Secretary Leila de Lima, on the other hand, has refuted the idea that her boss was responsible. In belittling the report of the PNP Board of Inquiry, she unblushingly splits hairs, pointing out that the concept of âchain of commandâ neither exists nor applies to the PNP, being a âcivilianâ and not a military entity. Therefore, her boss did not break something non-existent.
To De Limaâs argument, our neighborhood tricycle driver, Karyas, has this to say: âMaâam kahit civilian o militar, si PNoy ba ang nagpalakad ng operation o hindi? At sinunod ba niya o hindi ang tamang pamamaraan?â (Whether civilian or military, was PNoy on top of the operation or not? And did he or did he not follow correct procedures?)
In a media account, another presidential mouthpiece, Edwin Lacierda, in trying to exonerate Aquino, admitted that his boss had âinstructed Purisima to coordinate with Deputy Director General Leonardo Espina as the PNP officer in charge.â Lacierda then blatantly passed the buck to Purisima.
However, Lacierda unwittingly addressed the question of Karyas. Lacierda admitted that Aquino did not follow correct procedures, because he involved a suspended PNP Chief in a sensitive and dangerous police operation. And because Lacierda said that Aquino did the âinstructingâ to Purisima, that means the President was the man on top of the operation. In other words, Aquino was responsible.
Coloma will probably argue that involving Purisima was not an âunlawful act,â but he cannot deny that the act was âwillfulâ on the part of Aquino â unless Coloma tells us that his boss didnât know what he was doing.
In such a case, Karyas, our neighborhood tricycle driver, can tell Coloma bluntly, âMali pa rin iyon, sir. Huwag na kayong magpalusot!â (Thatâs still wrong, sir. Donât try to weasel your way!)
The palusot of Aquino and his apologists is reminiscent of US President Bill Clinton insisting that he never had sex with Monica Lewinsky and that he was never alone with her in the presidential office. As it turned out, Clintonâs definition of sex did not include fellatio, and by âoffice,â he included the quarters of his secretary, who was outside the presidential sanctum sanctorum but was still within the executiveâs official quarters.
Aquino did acknowledge responsibility in a speech before families of the Fallen 44 and Coloma has confirmed it. However, they have tried to water down the extent of Aquinoâs responsibility, pointing out that he had passed this on to Purisima and Napeñas.
Of course, any management book will tell you that you can delegate authority but not responsibility. Ergo, whether Aquino likes it or not, and whether De Lima acknowledges the chain of command or not, the President had full responsibility â call it command responsibility – for the operation and its aftermath.
Is Aquino accountable? He definitely is. He is answerable to the Filipino people. And the more he dodges accountability, the worse he is regarded by his âbosses.â
How about culpability? By their own admission, the presidential mouthpieces have admitted that Aquino did something that should not have been done, which was to involve Purisima in the operation. For that he is clearly culpable.
Of course, Aquino could claim that he did not know what he was doing, which would be somewhat mitigating. But the idea of a President who does not know what he is doing is a horrible thought â although quite believable, unfortunately.
Now, all of these refer only to Aquinoâs role in planning and mounting the SAF operation. But he committed other acts for which he cannot shirk responsibility, accountability and, in some cases, culpability.
Firstly, it was his responsibility to immediately react to and act on the ongoing skirmish between the SAF troopers and the BIFF-MILF fighters and to do something to save the lives of the commandoes. He was aware of what was happening and he was accountable and answerable not only to the PNP but to the entire country. His failure to act makes him culpable.
Secondly, the fact that it took him several days to make an official statement on the tragedy makes his culpability worse.
Thirdly, was it his responsibility to meet the remains of the Fallen 44 upon their arrival in Manila? His apologists will argue that it was also his responsibility to be present at the inauguration of an automotive plant. But was Aquinoâs accountability to the car company greater than his accountability to the PNP and to the families of the Fallen 44?
Finally, the unfortunate whirlpool of flawed responsibility, accountability and culpability has continued, with Aquinoâs clumsy denials, equivocation, blame-passing and taking liberties with the truth. It just gets worse every day.
Yet, all of that grief could have been avoided if Aquino had been âman enoughâ or âpresidential enoughâ to admit his mistakes at the outset:
âYes, we are dealing with a tragedy for which I am ultimately responsible, whatever mistakes anyone else may have made along the way. Yes, it was a mistake and a case of poor judgment on my part to have involved Alan Purisma in the operation and to have allowed him to keep other key people out of the loop. I am sorry for that. Yes, we will act with dispatch to ensure justice for the Fallen 44 and to take care of their families.â
Filipino culture does not demand hara kiri after such an act of contrition. We are a very forgiving and forgetful people. We have the admirable capacity to weigh the good things a person has done against the bad things and we always tend to favor the good. After a blizzard of media criticism and social media attacks, Aquino would have emerged from it all as if he had been in a sauna â smarting but refreshed and ready to start all over again.
At this point, Aquino has weaseled himself into a corner and his only recourse is to dare his detractors to do something about it. He is lucky. It is doubtful that anybody will. Itâs all sound and fury, signifying nothing.
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