Controversy erupts over WW2 plane’s wreckage

BINMALEY, Pangasinan — A piece of history has embroiled police and local officials of this town and neighboring Dagupan City into a controversy.

The debate centered on what is believed to be the wreckage of a World War II warplane which Dagupan officials claimed was forcibly taken from their jurisdiction.

The whole thing started, according to PO2 Raul Doria, duty officer of the Binmaley police, when a group of fishermen from Barangay Pugaro in Dagupan reported last Wednesday night that they found the wreckage of a vintage plane in the Sabangan River which is part of Binmaley.

Four Binmaley policemen, including Doria, and four men of the Regional Mobile Group went to the site. They later managed to bring the wreckage to the municipal police station.

But Senior Superintendent Noli Taliño, officer-in-charge of the Dagupan police, reported to the regional command that the wreckage was retrieved "commando-style" and in "gross violation of police operational procedure."

The Binmaley police belied the accusation, and Mayor Simplicio Rosario came to their defense, saying, "This is a simple matter that can be easily and quickly addressed with just a phone call."

What Rosario felt sad about was Dagupan Mayor Benjamin Lim accusing him in a letter of directing police and military men to "surreptitiously" and "forcibly" taking the plane’s wreckage.

"If Mayor Lim is protecting his area, so am I, but we can discuss this and arrive at a good solution. I have no interest in the plane," he said.

Apparently to settle the matter, the police are gathering the affidavits of those who found the wreckage and the law enforcers who went to the site to prove that the vintage plane’s remains were, indeed, discovered in Binmaley.

Some of those who found the plane claimed that they incurred P59,000 in debts for gasoline and the rental of a compressor they used to retrieve it from the Sabangan River.

Now, amid the controversy, they are at a loss as to whom they should charge their expenses.