Aquino, Napeñas broke chain of command in ‘Exodus’ – Lacson

Former Senator Panfilo Lacson said yesterday President Aquino and suspended chief of the Philippine National Police-Special Action Force (PNP-SAF) Director Getulio Pascua Napeñas broke the chain of command in the operation that led to the death of 44 members of the elite SAF in Mamasapano, Maguindanao, last January 25.

A Philippine Military Academy (PMA) graduate and PNP directorgeneral during the Estrada administration, Lacson said President Aquino, as commander-in-chief, should have told PNP officer-in-charge Deputy Director General Leonardo Espina about the plan to arrest Malaysian Zulfikli bin Hir and Filipino Abdul Basit Usman, both bomb experts.

Lacson said President Aquino did not bring in Espina to a brief-

ing in Malacañang last Jan. 9 on the Mamasapano operation dubbed “Oplan Exodus.’’ This meeting was held two weeks before the massing of 392 PNP-SAF policemen at the Moro Islamic Liberation Front ( MILF)influenced area in Mamasapano, Maguindanao,

In his testimony before the Senate Committee on Public Order headed by Sen. Grace Poe Llamanzares the other day, Chief Supt. Napeñas had said suspended PNP Director General Alan Purisima attended the Malacañang meeting and that there was no direct instruction from the President to him that the operation was a “go’’ or deferred.

Lacson said Napeñas followed the order of Purisima not to inform Espina and Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) Secretary Manuel “Mar” A. Roxas II of the Mamasapano operation.

But Purisima maintained at the same hearing that he only gave “advice,” not an “order,” to Napeñas on Oplan Exodus.

Sen. Miriam Defensor Santiago, chairperson of the Senate Committee on Constitutional Amendments, had earlier said that the President could be liable for prosecution before the International Criminal Court (ICC) because the chain of command was broken that led to the killing of the ‘’Fallen 44.’’

In a TV interview yesterday morning, Lacson said that “kung ikaw ay ang commander-in-chief or kaya ay ang chief PNP, dapat obserbahan mo rin at respetuhin yung chain of command (If you are the commander-in-chief or the PNP chief, you should also respect the chain of command).”

Lacson said disrespect was shown to PNP OIC Espina when he was not called to attend the Jan. 9 meeting at Malacañang.

Either the President or Napeñas should have informed Espina about the meeting or invited him to join them, he pointed out.

The fault of Napeñas was he did not recognize the chain of command where Espina was directly above him, he added.

It cannot be denied that there was “omission” on the part of the President, he said.

“We cannot have two PNP chiefs. There should only be one,” Lacson said.

Following the botched Mamasapano operation, President Aquino accepted the resignation of Purisima last week.

Lacson stressed that he does not see anything wrong with consulting Purisima but what he disagrees with is that the PNP OIC was ignored in “Oplan Exodus.”

He said he told Napeñas when he sought his advice last Friday that he should tell the truth to the Committee on Public Order and to accept responsibility over the botched Oplan Exodus.

He added that the Poe committee should not forget that the passage of the proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL) is now in peril in Congress because of the Mamasapano incident. (Mario B. Casayuran)