EDITORIAL - Asylum?

Former Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) general manager and former police official Royina Garma is now applying for political asylum in the US.

In case this name doesn’t ring a bell, she was the one who spilled the beans on the Davao Death Squad (DDS), claiming before the Senate last September that it was she who helped then President Rodrigo Duterte find someone to implement the DDS template in Davao City on a national level after he asked for her help.

If it still doesn’t ring a bell, she also served as Cebu City Police Office chief from 2018 to 2019. Yes, the same one accused of giving the reelection campaign of then Mayor Tomas Osmeña a hard time in the May 2019 election, although that is another issue entirely.

She might be doing this --asking to be protected by the US-- out of fear that the DDS might be out to get her for what she said against former president Duterte. Either that or because she wants to wiggle out of the case filed against her for the murder of former PCSO board secretary Wesley Barayuga.

Of course, the granting of her asylum is not up to us, but we don’t think that she deserves it.

Asylum should only be granted to those who are being politically persecuted, for those who are being oppressed. Facing charges that have been properly filed in court doesn’t really count as political persecution. Being suspected as complicit in the murder of thousands doesn’t count as being oppressed.

Besides, she may yet be counted as among those who will be held responsible along with Duterte, who is currently being detained in The Hague for alleged crimes against humanity, for the previous administration’s bloody war against drugs.

We still want answers from her. There is too much riding on these issues to let Garma slip from our grasp just yet. There’s the Barayuga murder case as well as the thousands killed during the drug war. She still has some answering to do.