EDITORIAL - It was mass suicide

The way the investigation is unfolding, the massacre in Maguindanao on Nov. 23 last year could end up being officially declared as a mass suicide. If those in power are compelled by an outraged public to make someone pay, the only ones who might serve time in prison for the most atrocious case of election violence in this country will be the small fry - the foot soldiers who pulled the trigger as their victims begged for mercy.

The piece that will be glaringly missing from that picture will be the motive. Did all the foot soldiers wake up on that sunny November morning, and together decided that they wanted to hold a turkey shoot in the bucolic hills of Ampatuan town, using human targets? And yet this is the picture that is slowly emerging, as members of the clan with the only motive strong enough to explain the brutal murder of 57 people are cleared one by one.

It started with the acquittal of clan patriarch and staunch presidential ally Andal Ampatuan Sr. by the Quezon City court in the rebellion case that was filed in connection with the massacre. Critics never saw a rebellion, whether actual or brewing as the government insisted, so the acquittal was expected.

The next to be cleared, this time by the Department of Justice, were Ampatuan’s son, Gov. Zaldy Ampatuan of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, and another relative, Mamasapano Mayor Akmad Ampatuan. This was for the more serious case of conspiracy in the mass murder. DOJ officials said the rebellion case against the two Ampatuans would still be pursued. But with the dismissal of the rebellion case against Andal Senior as a precedent, why should anyone expect the ruling on the two other Ampatuans to be any different?

A witness had alleged that Andal Senior and his sons had planned the massacre to punish their relatives the Mangudadatus, who had dared to challenge the Ampatuan hegemony in the ARMM. The only one who might not be cleared easily is Andal Jr., who is accused of leading the massacre and shooting some of the victims himself. But miracles can still happen in the Philippine justice system. Once again the public is seeing that in this administration, it’s good to know the law, but it’s better to know those who interpret it.