Mike Enriquez denies talking to driver of hijacked bus

GMA News anchor Mike Enriquez on Tuesday denied speaking with Alberto Lubang, the driver of the hijacked tourist bus, during the height of the Manila hostage crisis last August 23. “Ayon kay Mike Enriquez, wala siyang nakausap na kahit sino sa bus at ni minsan ay hindi siya sumubok na makausap ang sino sa bus (Mike Enriquez said he neither talked nor attempted to speak to anyone in the bus)," said GMA News and Public Affairs in an official statement. What radio listeners actually heard on the other line was the voice of Mike Rogas, anchor of Radio Mindanao Network (RMN), who along with his colleague Erwin Tulfo interviewed Mendoza several times on the mobile phone. Lubang, facing the inter-agency committee tasked to investigate the hostage tragedy, said at around 5 p.m. on August 23, hostage-taker Rolando Mendoza handed him a cellphone and told him Enriquez was on the line. He said Mendoza, a dismissed policeman asking for his reinstatement, gave him the cellphone just about the time he, Mendoza, received a letter from the Ombudsman. “Kausapin mo si Mike Enriquez (Talk to Mike Enriquez)," Lubang quoted Mendoza as telling him.

“Mr. Driver, Mr. Driver, kamusta na kayo diyan (Mister Driver, how are you and the hostages)?" Lubang quoted the person on the line as telling him. Justice Secretary Leila de Lima, chair of the Incident Investigation and Review Committee (IIRC), asked Lubang if he knew who was on the other line, to which Lubang replied, “Hindi ko po kilala. Iba po yung boses. Matining po, maliit po iyong boses (I wasn’t familiar with the voice. It was high-pitched)." Lubang later told IIRC member Herman Basbano that Mendoza handed him the cell phone while the hostage-taker went through the contents of the envelope from the Ombudsman. “Pinahawakan niya (Mendoza) ang cell phone dahil bubuksan niya ang envelope. Sabi, ‘Hawakan mo muna, kausapin mo si Mike Enriquez.’ Iyan, nag-hello ako, narinig ko sabi si Mike Enriquez po siya," he said. (Mendoza gave me the phone because he was opening the envelope from the Ombudsman. He said, ‘Hold this for me, Mike Enriquez is on the line, talk to him.’ I said hello and then the person on the line introduced himself as Mike Enriquez.) Basbano asked Lubang if he asked the person on the line to identify himself, to which Lubang replied, “Hindi po, ang narinig ko lang sabi, Mister driver, si Mike Enriquez po ito." (I did not. But I heard him say, ‘Mister driver, this is Mike Enriquez.’) Basbano then asked him if the caller said, “Excuse me po," Enriquez’s famous line. Lubang said the caller didn’t. Mendoza was killed at the conclusion of the 11-hour hostage drama, but not before he shot the hostages, all of them tourists from Hong Kong, killing eight of them. Right before shots were heard from the bus, Mendoza told someone over the phone that he would start shooting if his brother, SPO2 Gregorio Mendoza, would not be released immediately. His brother was arrested earlier after allegedly meddling with the negotiations. Mendoza, at the time, was being interviewed on the radio. - with Larissa Mae Suarez/KBK/RSJ, GMANews.TV