Gen. Garcia’s case and AFP reforms

Perhaps because I broke the graft story of Maj. Gen. Carlos Carcia, I’m often asked what I think of his ongoing court martial. My only reply is that they made us believe a military trial is fast, but it’s turning out to be as slow as civilian courts. The seven-man tribunal lets Garcia’s civilian counsel delay proceedings and badger witnesses, Atty. Leonard de Vera, head of the Integrated Bar observer panel, complains, and their law member isn’t advising them to stop it.

Meanwhile, Garcia seems to be getting more than VIP treatment. The Oakwood coup leaders are restricted behind double bars at the Intelligence Service-AFP Detention Center. Garcia too was supposed to be jailed there pending trial, but reportedly threatened to expose his confederates if they did. They put him instead in "quarters befitting a general," an air-conditioned officer’s flat, where he has since moved in his high-tech home entertainment system.

Days after the brass gave Garcia the apartment, they also appointed as ISAFP chief a former subordinate at the J-6 (Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Comptrollership). Opportunely a newspaper reported it, and Congress’ Commission on Appointments promptly rejected the colonel’s promotion. Nonetheless the brass replaced the ISAFP compound commander in Camp Aguinaldo with another one of Garcia’s old factotums at J-6. And up to now AFP chief Gen. Efren Abu refuses de Vera’s panel permission to inspect Garcia’s quarters, if only to quell murmurs of VIP treatment.

All this is enough to make even doubters of conspiracy theories sit up. And I had to get it off my chest during the open forum that followed Abu’s speech Friday on military reforms to the Foundation for Economic Freedom. His reaction was terse: there is no concerted effort to prevent Garcia from squealing by giving him VIP treatment. "As chief of staff, I am telling you that," he said.

That may not sound much of an assurance for civilians inured to political doubletalk. But it is for soldiers who are used to accepting their superior’s word, not so much for the military command chain than because their lives depend on it. And Abu holds their trust because of his many improvements of their fighting capability. Just that, he’s more a doer than a talker. He showed it when he said, "I cannot answer any more questions about the Garcia case because I will be the final reviewing authority of the tribunal’s verdict."

In his speech Abu announced the abolition of the Logistics Command by Apr. 1. The unit that occupies a third of general headquarters has earned notoriety, as retired Constabulary chief Ramon Montaño reacted to Abu’s speech, for being "too dealer-friendly...we buy what dealers want us to buy, dealers give the AFP what it doesn’t need." It reeks of bid rigging and bill padding for million-peso kickbacks. Officers and civilian employees lobby for posting to the LogCom. A dealer narrates visiting the unit to get forms for a forthcoming bidding, and had to part with his diamond ring after an officer took an inordinate interest asking too many questions about it.

Abu told reporters he was fed up with talk of corruption at the LogCom: "Alam niyo pag sinabing LogCom, kahit kami sa Armed Forces hindi magandang pakinggan, nakakasawa na." And so the task of procuring supplies and equipment will be transferred to the major services–Army, Navy, and Air Force–which know better what they need. But all biddings will still be administered, under close watch of bishops and businessmen, by Maj. Gen. Rey Rivera of J-4 (Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Logistics). Defense Sec. Avelino Cruz had put the system in place in Aug. after abolishing all 124 graft-ridden bidding committees in various levels of the military.

Retired Brig. Gen. Jose Almonte, an original advocate of military cleanup as founding chairman of the Reform-the-AFP Movement, spoke ahead of Abu. He traced military corruption in part to the "comptroller family"–50-odd officers and employees who were experts in "conversion", the habit of encashing for personal use checks for supplies and operations. The Mafia controlled AFP fund releases, and in exchange for their plum postings, took care of their higher-ups, including going-away cash presents upon retirement. "For decades the bulk of funds for maintenance and other operating expenses – the traditional raw material for conversion–has been retained at headquarters, and only a fraction distributed among the field commands," Almonte lamented. That’s why demoralized, ill-equipped soldiers have failed to lick communist and Moro rebels. He noted, though, that immediate past AFP chief Narciso Abaya had made sure that 70 percent of the MOOE reached the field. Abu built upon his predecessor’s reforms to make it an 80:20 ratio.

Abu on the day of his rise to chief of staff had abolished J-6, replacing it with four offices: comptrollership, resource management, internal audit, and accounting. The office heads report to him daily, unlike in the past when the J-6, holding sway over budgeting and accounting, reported to The Deputy Chief of Staff.

The new setup prevents collusion of the four units. Still, I pointed out to Abu, he retained as chief accountant the same one who had served under Generals Garcia and Jacinto Ligot at J-6, and is now being investigated by the Ombudsman for complicity in their reported scams. To this, Abu had another terse reply: the chief accountant is a civilian who cannot be put under military rules and enjoys civil service security of tenure.

Again, not much of an assurance for civilians fed up with procedural loopholes. But perhaps it is for soldiers who know that their chief of staff is bent on leaving behind a legacy of reforms. Then again, Abu will serve for only eight months, until retirement in June. It was a succession of short-stint chiefs (Garcia was J-6 to five of them) that allowed comptrollers a great deal of slack in handling funds while the bosses were too busy with a lot of other matters.

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