Key officials not in hostage area when shooting began

Both Manila Mayor Alfredo Lim, who decided on the "wear-him-out" strategy, and Manila police chief Rodolfo Magtibay, commander of the police forces surrounding the Quirino Grandstand, were absent from the scene when hostage-taker Rolando Mendoza opened fire on his hostages. Lim had gotten hungry and invited Magtibay to a nearby restaurant known for siopao and fried crabs. Speaking on Friday before the five-member Incident Investigation and Review Committee (IIRC) tasked to probe the hostage crisis, Lim said that he decided to go to the Emerald Garden Restaurant even after hostage-taker Rolando Mendoza fired a warning shot — signaling that negotiations had bogged down and Mendoza’s mood had changed for the worse. "Hindi pa po ako nanananghalian kaya pumunta ako sa Emerald. Kaya dun na lang kami sa Emerald, para dun ang extension ng command post (I hadn’t had lunch yet so I went to Emerald. We decided to stay at the Emerald, so that the command post’s extension would also be there)," Lim told the panel. "Nothing was happening," he also said. Lim added that before leaving the Quirino Grandstand area, he told Manila Police District (MPD) head Chief Superintendent Rodolfo Magtibay that the strategy was to wear out Mendoza until he had no choice but to free the hostages. Magtibay was the overall ground commander during the hostage crisis. Instead of wearing down, Mendoza snapped, triggered perhaps by any number of events whose impact was apparently underestimated by Lim, a former Manila police chief himself known for his gruff demeanor. From Quirino to Emerald "Mga 6:45 p.m. ay nagpaalam na ako kay General Magtibay. Sabi ko sa kanya, 'O, general, magkaka-tagalan ito. We have to play a waiting game, tingnan natin baka ito (Mendoza) mapuyat, mapagod, baka mag-abot ng kinaumagahan'," Lim said. (Around 6:45 p.m., I told General Magtibay I had to go. I told him, 'General, this will take a while. We have to play a waiting game, let’s see, Mendoza might get sleepy, tired, it might take until morning.’) Lim then invited Magtibay to join him at the restaurant before 7 p.m. Interior Undersecretary Rico Puno and National Capital Region Police Office head Director Leocadio Santiago were with them at the Emerald restaurant, but the mayor did not mention that President Benigno Aquino III was also there. Aquino himself said earlier he was at the restaurant, some three blocks away from the Quirino Grandstand area, to monitor the situation and meet with other officials handling the crisis. During Friday’s proceedings, it was also revealed that four of the eight hostages killed in the hostage crisis may have died during the MPD assault against Mendoza. (See related story: 4 hostages may have died at the height of hostage crisis assault) "Four of the Hong Kong nationals sustained gunfire as a result of the assault," said IIRC member Roan Libarios, citing information given by Philippine National Police (PNP) Director General Jesus Verzosa during an earlier executive session. Tentative and visibly nervous throughout his testimony, Magtibay neither denied nor confirmed Libarios’ charge, saying only that the MPD Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team faced a "very hard" situation and they "tried their best."
The first shots fired Both Magtibay and Lim were thus absent from the Quirino Grandstand when the hostage crisis began to unravel, as Mendoza opened fire inside the bus, presumably killing the first two hostages as reported live by radio station RMN’s anchor Michael Rogas. "Don't you think it was poor judgment on your part to remove the ground commander from the crime scene?" Libarios asked Lim. "I did not order him (Magtibay), I invited him. He should have informed me that the situation was volatile," the mayor replied, adding that he would not have invited the ground commander to the restaurant had he known that the situation was bad. Lim also said he was only monitoring the situation through his mobile phone because there was no television in the restaurant. "Nagpakuha ako ng TV, eh ang tagal bago dumating nung TV, tapos sira pa (I sent for a TV, but it took a long time to arrive, and then we found out it wasn’t working)." Magtibay only returned to the grandstand when the first shots were fired, Lim admitted. "General Magtibay received a call na nagkaka-putukan na nga doon. Kaya kinailangan niya nang umalis (General Magtibay received a call saying that there was already shooting, and so he had to go)," he said. At around 7:20 p.m., Mendoza began firing the first gunshots a few minutes after a live broadcast showed his brother, SPO2 Gregorio Mendoza, being handcuffed and forcibly carried into a police vehicle at a nearby police community precinct. (See: Massacre in Nation’s Heart: Timeline of Manila bus siege) Lim has admitted ordering the handcuffing of Gregorio. The driver of the Hong Thai Travel tourist bus managed to escape from the bus after the initial gunshots. He ran toward policemen and frantically announced that all the passengers had been shot dead. During this time, Magtibay said he was already on the ground and ordered the MPD's Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team to launch an assault and secure the hostages. "It came to my mind that I have to act immediately to save the remaining hostages," said Magtibay, who was grilled by the panel before Lim. What followed was the bungled hostage rescue attempt of the ill-equipped and unprepared Manila police. Eight tourists from Hong Kong were killed. Wear him out or take him out? DILG Undersecretary Puno earlier in the day told the panel that he had treated the hostage situation as a local crisis to be handled by Lim, whose plan was to resolve the crisis by tiring out Mendoza. (See: DILG's Puno: We planned to wear out hostage-taker) Puno said it was considered a local crisis because it occurred in Manila, and Mendoza was a former member of the MPD. "The general idea there was to save lives, even that of the hostage-taker. If we can save the life of even the hostage-taker, then we would be very successful," he added. There were several opportunities for the two negotiators to overpower Mendoza, who had his firearm hanging by his side. Snipers could have also taken him out as he stood in the bus doorway. The police, instead, allowed him to extend the drama to its bloody conclusion. For his part, Lim defended the MPD from widespread criticism that they were inept and ill-prepared to handle a hostage crisis of such magnitude. "The police officers headed by General Magtibay did their best to ensure the safety of the hostages, and in spite of the lack of the necessary equipment — the SWAT team, in spite of its deficiencies — they really tried their very best to make entry into the bus. But unfortunately, they were unable to penetrate the bus at the earliest possible time," said Lim. However, in the eyes of much of the world watching on live television, "Manila's finest" were staging a tragic comedy routine, complete with a slip-sliding retreat from inside the bus when Mendoza fired at them. The police violated nearly all the principles of a successful assault. They were slow when they should have been swift, there was no element of surprise, and they weren't even wearing masks to protect themselves from the teargas they lobbed inside the bus to flush Mendoza out. It is still not clear why Magtibay chose the local police to attack the bus when an elite special action force was on standby behind the grandstand. "May mga tao at sibilyan na they do not know the tension, the pressure, the stress in a hostage situation. Kung minsan po ang layman's point of view ng mga tao ay kakaiba dun sa line of thinking ng mga police operatives. First and foremost, you cannot take it from them [policemen] that they did their best but their best was not good enough," the mayor added. (There are people, civilians who do not know the tension, the pressure, the stress in a hostage situation. Sometimes the public’s point of view is different from the line of thinking of police operatives. First and foremost, you cannot take it from policemen that they did their best but their best was not good enough.) Situation was 'underestimated, misread' Justice Sec. Leila de Lima had a different reaction, however, to Lim’s disclosures. Overall, "there was an underestimation and misreading of the situation" by the local crisis committee, especially because Lim left the scene even after Mendoza fired a warning shot, De Lima said. "You were repeatedly saying na wala namang nangyari…[pero] noong nag-warning shot si Mendoza, nalaman niyo na yung Ombudsman letter was rejected by him, and so in spite of that, sa tingin niyo walang significant na nangyari?" asked De Lima. (You were repeatedly saying that nothing was happening… but when Mendoza fired that warning shot, you realized that that the Ombudsman letter was rejected by him, and so in spite of that, you still thought nothing significant was happening?) Lim replied: "Yes, ma'am." Ombudsman connection Meanwhile, the IIRC will invite Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez to answer further questions regarding the role of her office in the hostage crisis. (See: Ombudsman to be invited to hostage tragedy probe) Magtibay told the IIRC earlier that he called to ask the Office of the Ombudsman to release a decision on Mendoza’s motion for reconsideration of his dismissal from duty. The Ombudsman responded with a letter assuring a review of Mendoza’s case in 10 days. The driver of the bus also said in a sworn statement that Mendoza spoke over the phone with officials from the Ombudsman’s office during the crisis.—With Andreo C. Calonzo/JMA/LRS/JV/HS, GMANews.TV