Abadia: No longer an officer but still a gentleman

No longer an officer but still a gentleman.

Gen. Lisandro "Boy" Abadia, former chief of the Armed Forces of the Philippines who permanently hanged up his military uniform on April 12, 1994, is still every inch the soldier he once was.

A graduate of the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) at Fort Del Pilar in Baguio City, Abadia is a seasoned combatant on land, sea and air, having seen action in Vietnam, Jolo, Basilan, Zamboanga and the Cordillera region, as well as in past coup attempts.

He was a complete Army officer with specialization in airborne, special weapons, jungle warfare, amphibious landing and artillery.

He also finished pilot qualification courses in the OV-10 aircraft, S-211 trainer planes, F-5 fighter jets and UH-1H tactical helicopters. Even as chief of staff, he flew five combat missions with the OV-10.

Unknown to many, Abadia significantly contributed in quashing last month’s coup attempt against President Arroyo.

He revealed that the coup plotters had tried to persuade, if not literally buy, the cooperation of senior military officers.

Big money was available at the time, he confided.

But Abadia was always a step ahead of them, undoing the plotters’ work and successfully frustrating their intentions.

"I reminded my colleagues in the active service to always abide by the chain of command, although at the end of the day, it would still be their own conscience that will prevail," he said.

He urged the officers to "examine your heart" in choosing between their loyalty to one man and loyalty to the Constitution.

He charged that those who spearheaded the failed power grab "blatantly used the poor," many of whom were even drugged into blind obedience.

During the people power revolt of 1986 that toppled the Marcos dictatorship, Abadia said he was on the "wrong side doing the right thing."

He was Army operations chief at the time, and received orders from then Armed Forces chief Gen. Fabian Ver through his superiors to attack and raze Camp Aguinaldo where defectors Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile and Constabulary chief Lt. Gen. Fidel Ramos were holed up.

Abadia said he made all excuses to defer carrying out the orders, even reporting to his commander that the mortar shells were defective and might hit instead the throngs of people massed up on EDSA.

Cool amid crisis

Abadia remains magnanimous and cool even in the face of adversities and vicious attacks that could mercilessly demolish lesser mortals.

His detractors have tried to taint his track record and reputation both as a corporate manager and a military officer, yet the man has nothing but understanding and forgiveness in his heart.

"I have forgiven those who wish me ill. May God give them the gift of humility and may peace reign in their hearts," Abadia said in an interview with The STAR.

He has been vilified and accused of involvement in some irregularities and alleged misdeeds, but somehow he kept his dignity and demeanor solid and unsullied, vindicated by his own humility and courage to stand up to his accusers.

The latest verbal attack against him was his alleged role in electoral fraud in the South during the May 14 elections.

Although he admitted that he was in Mindanao at the time, he clarified that he was there simply to monitor the proceedings, or as a watchdog for the administration.

He nonchalantly shrugged off the allegations, saying: "I cannot help it if my mere presence intimidates them (political opposition)," he said.

Earlier on, he was again the object of a vicious hate campaign; that Mrs. Arroyo, who initially eyed him as her National Security Adviser, dropped him like a hot potato because of his alleged complicity in a multimillion-peso mess involving the Retirement and Separation Benefits System (RSBS) of the AFP.

He particularly bewailed one newspaper’s headline that said "GMA discards Abadia." He said the editor could have chosen a kinder word such as "recalls" or "reconsiders."

Abadia pointed out that after the damage had been done, the newspaper tried to make amends "by printing in the inner pages and in small print" its apology.

But he dismissed the gesture as "too little, too late, too shallow."

He claimed the demolition job was timed perfectly to deny him the opportunity to air his side and balance the story.

In an open letter, he charged that the attacks against him were the handiwork of some politicians who wanted to push their selfish political agenda "at the expense of others."

"Envy, ambition, hate, guilt, vengeance can sometimes drive people to extreme anger and cruelty," he stressed.

Abadia also lamented that the black propaganda against him was being waged by a former Cabinet member of the Estrada administration with the help of some military officers, among them former schoolmates at the PMA.

He said as early as July 1998, it was already common knowledge that the Cabinet secretary was eyeing the presidency in 2004. "With the encouragement of my detractors, he went on a media binge accusing generals, both active and retired, with insinuations of wrongdoing in the running of AFP financial institutions," Abadia’s letter stated.

"It was obvious to many that the real target was me. If he could bring me down, what fantastic media hype it could result," he added.

The attempt to revive the controversy compelled Abadia to ask for a certification from the Office of the Ombudsman giving him a clean bill of health.

Professionalism

Abadia said he was able to reinstill professionalism and solidarity in the military during his watch.

He said he inherited a very fractious military organization where promotions and assignments were sometimes made on the basis of previous assignments and affiliations.

"I restored the merit system where promotions and assignments are based on set criteria, an institutional rather than personal decision-making process."

He said he believes in reconciliation and giving people a chance to prove their true worth.

He also cited as among his salient achievements the dramatic reduction of the New People’s Army’s strength from 26,000 armed combatants in 1988 to just 6,000 in 1994 by setting in motion an operation code-named "Oplan Lambat Bitag" that basically involved giving the communist rebels a dose of their own tactics and strategies against the military.

In this aspect, former renegade Army officer Victor Corpuz, now chief of the Intelligence Service of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, played a crucial role by telling all that he knew about the NPA’s guerrilla warfare and techniques.

"I picked his brain," Abadia said.