SINCE the Philippine National Police (PNP) has been quite careless in handling the case of the alleged robbery and abduction on Epifanio de los Santos Avenue on September 1, it is not clear if the PNP is any less criminal than actual crime groups. And since the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) has been somewhat lax in the case of Aldrin Jeff Cudia’s nongraduation from the Philippine Military Academy (PMA), it is now unclear on what the AFP is all about. What is clear, however, is that we now have a really troubling situation.
The fact that the two cases are still under investigation would make it highly irregular for either the PNP or the AFP to declare that they’re guilty, because the “facts” involved are based on conjecture. Needless to say, these facts should be investigated. But in the AFP case, there are other facts that are beyond question, like that one member of the PMA Honor Committee is Cudia’s rival for top honors. This cries for a correction. This goes beyond mere surveys.
I think that the facts should have a legal background. Convictions are possible. But what do the members of the AFP and the PNP do when they are actually convicted? Well, the organizations simply have to accept that and make corrections. What do they have to correct? For the PNP, it’s the policemen involved in crimes. For the AFP, it’s the honor code, and it should be corrected in such a way that it will be fair to everyone. In other words, you cannot have an honor code that excludes its authors from being bound to it.
The AFP and the PNP might correct themselves because, in any point of view, the cases involving these two organizations raise important questions, and this act—and the fact they’re getting heard—is already the beginning of the search for solutions.