The brazen attack and assassination of Negros Oriental Governor Roel Degamo, that also led to the killing of 9 others and injuries to 13, in his own home, is quite shocking for those of us who thought that Negros Island is no longer a war zone where either it is normal for rebel activity or political vendettas to endanger innocent lives.
Everyone must’ve seen the CCTV footage of the armed attack by now, where a group of 5-6 fully armed men, decked out in tactical gear, pretending to be either police and/or military, with their hands on their assault rifles, entered the grounds and got into CQC (close quarters combat) proximity to the governor, who was hosting a 4Ps activity in his home.
Once their target was acquired, the mercenaries suddenly raised their assault weapons and started firing at their targets, which were primarily the governor and his security detail, although they didn’t seem to care about collateral damage, as the death toll and injuries they inflicted indicated.
After the brazen and brutal hit, the mercenaries withdrew and fled. However, within the weekend, 4 of the attackers were pursued, cornered and arrested, while 1 was killed in a shootout, which showed that even if they had a good plan for killing Degamo, they didn’t seem have a plan for getting away with it. I guess that’s why some people are good at being triggermen and others are good masterminds.
Hopefully our law enforcers and justice system is better than all of these kind of killers combined because we really need this case to be solved quickly and justice delivered, which means the arrest and prosecution of the perpetrators and mastermind(s). Because if this becomes another unsolved assassination, it can’t be considered a fluke and could become the start of a trend when it comes to conflict resolution among politicos and people who can afford hit squads.
Whoever contracted the hit must’ve assumed that they can get away with it. And, if they don’t get caught and punished to the full extent of our laws, others who have the same mindset, resources, and problems will definitely follow suit. That is why it critical for our government and its awesome resources to show the Filipino people that nobody can just decide to kill people, whether in positions of power or not, and get away with it in this country.
It may be shocking, but this is what happens when killing becomes too easy. Our own government started it during Rodrigo Duterte’s brutal drug war, when the supposed dregs of society were being killed by death squads. What happened last Saturday in Pamplona, Negros Oriental, was simply the gentrification of those killings. Instead of targeting druggies, they leveled up and the target this time was a governor. There may be a huge gap in terms of financial, societal, and political status, but the bottom line is the same: a suspected druggie and a governor are basically humans who shouldn’t have to fear death squads. The rest of us, who would like to think we belong between those two sectors that belong to the extreme ends of society, and have nothing to do with them, should have a government that protects us from that same fear as well.
Another factor that made this killing relatively easy is the normalization of powerful firearms and combat gear in this country. During the height of the pandemic, didn’t it feel silly and overkill to see COVID checkpoints manned by cops in full battle gear and assault rifles? But, if you come to think of it, in the end, it happens so often that we have become used to the unnecessary show of weaponry in public spaces.
The sight of armed men in uniform, tactical gear and powerful firearms became so normal that even Gov. Degamo and his security detail weren’t alarmed when masked men in full battle gear waltzed into their compound. If it hadn’t been normalized by our own government, alarm bells would have been set off the moment that scary group of armed men approached the governor’s residence. That is what we get when we have a government that likes to show off its deadly weapons as a way of earning its citizens’ respect, which could’ve been earned through quality public service.
Druggies being butchered left and right for six years didn’t bother us, but now that a governor has been assassinated inside his own home, isn’t it worrying? It is now up to government to assure us that the situation is still under control and the country has not descended into chaos. The first and most important matter that has to be resolved would be bringing the killers and the mastermind to justice, ASAP.
If that can’t happen, then we might have to prepare to defend ourselves from all sorts of killers every time we offend a war freak out there who thinks that a bullet through the head will solve any problem in this country where connected killers have proven time and again that they can get away with murder.*
