by Vic Ryan Agot

Created on: August 31, 2010

The hostage-taking incident that involved a policeman killing hostages was downright appalling. The nation, as well as the whole world, was glued to the live feed of the incident playing out on national television. By the hour, the Philippines was once again slowly climbing on top of the wall of shame; being in the front page of newspapers about something inconceivable.  And again, the Philippines has started a joke that nobody is laughing about.

Not too long ago, we garnered the top spot of the “illustrious” title of being the most dangerous country for journalists when a barbaric act was committed against the members of the media, Mangudadatu family and some unlucky individuals who just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. And for the record, we beat Iraq on that title. Iraq has been a warzone for some years now but yes, we nipped the title so easily from them.

Now with this gruesome crime laid out in the open sky with the world watching, what does it make of us now, the most dangerous place on earth? Apart from this, what other “prestigious” titles have we garnered so far? Let’s see, one of the most corrupt in Asia, one of the poorest in Asia, one of the dirtiest in Asia and the 4th runner up of the recent Miss Universe 2010. You see, I kinda like the last one right there but the rest are just disgraceful. Dissecting the whole incident on what went wrong will just be like opening a can of worms; nevertheless, let’s stress on the big ones here. 

1. The Philippine National Police needs some upgrade.

I’m shocked. Does this sound new to you or is it just me? From the beginning, we have had low police visibility and its crisis response is ridiculously slow. I mean, did you see that cop who was wearing a hat with no Kevlar vest on in responding to the hostage situation? Not only that, he turned its visor to the back; ala Robin Padilla, leaning for dear life at the side of the hellish bus but for what? Who would throw a smoke grenade when you yourself do not have a mask on? The policemen retreated not only because they were being shot at but also because they couldn’t stand the smoke! One element of a rescue mission is to take the enemy by surprise but does hammering the doors with a sledgehammer over and over sound surprising to you? Worse, one officer accidentally threw the hammer all the way in!

There was a mention about the sniper killing the gunman from a distance, but from what I saw

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