Witness who could've prevented Maguindanao massacre grilled

A defense lawyer in the Maguindanao massacre case on Thursday moved to discredit one of the prosecution witnesses by zeroing in on the latter's late decision to report the crime and his political affiliation. During the hearing at Camp Bagong Diwa in Taguig City, lawyer Gregorio Narvasa II asked Noh Akil, a village official in Maguindanao, why he did not report the unusual number of armed men massing in his area of jurisdiction despite sensing a looming violence. Akil was a councilman in Barangay Salman in Ampatuan town, where, on November 23 last year, 57 people, more than half of them journalists, were mercilessly killed by armed men allegedly led by then Datu Unsay mayor Andal Ampatuan Jr., scion of the powerful Ampatuan family. Narvasa told reporters in an interview that Akil could have helped prevent the massacre from happening had he alerted authorities about it. “If you feel you are in danger, you have to know the extent, imminence, and closeness of danger... But he (Akil) did none of those. That’s unusual," Narvasa said. In his earlier testimony, Akil said he saw how the armed men establish a checkpoint at Sitio Masalay as early as November 20. A resident living near the massacre site, Akil also said he heard the gunshots that killed the victims. Akil said that after being warned by one of the armed men of a looming danger, he instructed his five children to flee to a nearby area three days later, or on November 23. On that same day, he and his wife went to a nearby Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) camp to hide. But Narvasa doubted whether Akil really feared for his and his family’s lives, noting that they evacuated only on the day of the massacre itself, considering that Akil claimed to have sensed about the plan to block the victims' convoy at Sitio Masalay three days before the incident. Narvasa also questioned why it took Akil three weeks to report on what he knew about the incident, noting that the latter executed an affidavit only on December 11. "If you are a witness, you could apply the very next day," Narvasa told reporters. At one point of the cross examination, Narvasa also asked what political party Akil belonged to. In response, the witness said in Maguindanaon: "Kung ano ang sabihin ng mayor at kapitan namin, iyon ang aming partido (Our mayor and village captain dictate to us our political party)." The mayor of Ampatuan town is Zacarias Sangki, from a known rival clan of the Ampatuans, whose prominent members stand accused for 57 counts of murder. Asked if he thought Akil’s testimony was politically motivated, Narvasa said: "You can draw your conclusions from his testimony, but that’s where it is leading." Akil said he did not report the incident to Sangki because the latter was on a pilgrimage at the time. He also said he did not bother reporting the incident to security forces because he had already seen them rush to the crime site after the massacre. "We saw ranking military and police officials going there and besides, we were only ordinary individuals," Akil said, adding that he was scared of the Ampatuans. That statement, however, was stricken off the court record because it was deemed "unresponsive" to Narvasa’s questioning. — KBK/RSJ, GMANews.TV