No double-standards; fight your own war

LETTERS FROM THE AGNO

David March Fianza

My deepest sympathies to the family, relatives and friends of Police Col. Michael Bawayan Jr., 49; of Brookside, Baguio City and Sagada, Mountain Province. May the Almighty provide you guidance and strength to quickly move away from an unwanted tragic incident.
    What an unnecessary incident and waste of a good life! The young Sulu provincial police chief was shot dead by his own Police Staff Sgt. Imran Jilah, 43, a Tausug; after the latter was allegedly scolded by his superior for sporting long hair on August 6, 2021.
    There was an allegation of an earlier incident where SSgt. Jilah turned his back on his officer so that he was slapped by the latter but that has to be verified.
    Both PNP personnel were pronounced dead shortly after the staff sergeant shot Col. Bawayan at close range, and was gunned down in turn by the colonel's aides at a quarantine checkpoint in Jolo, Sulu.
    Some Tausugs claim that the shooting incident was more than integrity and disciplining a police force but a conflict involving dignity and honor which is called “martabbat”.
    But like any ordinary Igorot observer from the Cordillera, we shed our old skin as soon as we join organizations whose members expect to be treated equally. Understandably in the police force, there must be respect for officers and the chain of command anywhere and anytime.  
    Every member of the police force has to properly perform his duty to ensure that everything is in order, discipline and professionalism must be maintained in the ranks, and standard policies have to be obeyed. There is no room for double-standard in the PNP and nobody is exempted.
    In places where culture and religion are considered even stronger in the performance of jobs, and are at times above the law of the land, I wonder how organizations such as the national police can survive. A member of the organization has to follow standard rules or quit.
    The culture in police and military circles is to put a premium on mental and physical appearance as the best elements necessary in gaining the respect of citizens. At least, I learned that in high school CAT and college ROTC.
    The Sulu police station, like any other station in the country, should equally be treated in terms of discipline, behavior, and appearance. As earlier stated, there are no double-standards and no exemptions.
    In police and military organizations, bad incidents involving officers and subordinates cannot be avoided. There are many reported instances where officers beat up men who were found sleeping at guardhouses.
    In Baguio, I saw a cop slap in front of a bar manager, a drunk policeman who refused to pay for his drinks and the dancing girls he called to his table. Obviously, there was no police discipline here.
    One time on a vacation in Lagawe, I stopped to listen to a police captain reprimand a subordinate for chewing “momma” while the morning flag ceremony was going on.
    The poor cop was scolded in public. But no, he did not pull a gun to shoot his chief. He obediently walked away to go wash his mouth as ordered. No unnecessary argument about culture ensued and everything was well that ended well.  
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After a 20-year war in Afghanistan, the Taliban has taken over the government again after the American soldiers withdrew. It was so swift that even US officials groped for explanations on how the defeat happened. The Taliban conquered an Afghan army which was known to be much bigger, trained and equipped by the Americans.
    The United States claimed that the Afghan War was their longest war and that it should not have ended the way it did because the scene of people rushing to get inside an airplane reminds of the evacuation after their withdrawal from Vietnam in 1975.
    Listening to US President Joe Biden talk on TV the other week, his reason for withdrawing after 20 years of fighting was that it is “time for the Afghans to be the ones to fight for their country”.
    He is right in a way that no soldier should get killed in a war that is not his own, especially when the continuous fighting has to stop at some point because there is no end in sight.  
    True, all nations including us Filipinos, should not expect other soldiers to fight our war for us. By this time, the US should have learned from the military interventions that it did in many countries in the past.
    That is why there is doubt on whether the US will fight for us in case of a shooting war between the Philippines and its enemies inside the country and around Asia. We have to fight our own war, just in case.