Soldiers selling firearms to Maute?

The government has threatened to throw soldiers in jail if found selling firearms to Maute terrorists and other enemies of the state.

Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana warned about the penalties, including discharge from service, after confirming that one of the sources of firearms of the Maute rebels was from some “unscrupulous” soldiers.

“Selling is – or magbebenta ka ng baril sa labas – is a big offense in the military and ma-court martial ‘yan, mabibilanggo pa. Babayaran pa niya ‘yung firearms (Selling weapons is a big offense in the military. He may face court martial, jail and pay for the lost firearms),” he added.

Lorenzana said when he was still in the military, erring soldiers who sold firearms to enemies were subjected to court martial proceedings. “We have identified them and we punished them. We punished those, we discharged them, we court-martialed them,” he said.

He said the same penalty applies for soldiers who could not adequately explain the loss of their firearms.

A military official earlier revealed that many of the firearms recovered from the areas occupied by Maute group were governmentissued weapons. Capt. Jo-ann Petinglay, spokesman of the Task Force Marawi, reportedly said somebody from the government must have sold the weapons to the enemies.