Will partial truth be able to set our country free?
The testimony of self-confessed and alleged former member of the so-called “Davao Death Squad” (DDS), Edgar Matobato, during the Senate inquiry on claimed extrajudicial killings in the country raised more questions than providing answers to the issue being investigated.
Was he telling the whole truth and nothing but the truth? Anything less than these truths will render him without any credibility.
On Matobato’s allegations that then Mayor and now President Rodrigo Duterte ordered the killing of the supporters of former Speaker Prospero Nograles, now Davao City Representative Karlo Alexei Nograles was quick to counter that none of their family’s supporters were killed. Former Speaker Nograles also countered Matobator’s allegation. Was Matobato telling the truth and did Representative Nograles and his father lie or was it the other way around? Given this situation, it should have been easy for Matobato to substantiate his claim by giving out the names of the Nograles supporters that the so-called DDS killed.
The sister of President Duterte, Jocelyn, also countered Matobato’s claim that her alleged dance instructor-lover was ordered killed by the former Mayor.
If these two allegations of Matobato are proven to be untrue, how should the Senate and we, the people, should take the rest of his allegations.
The DDS is not a new issue. It has been raised during the incumbency of President Duterte as Davao City Mayor and no less than the Commission on Human Rights has investigated the same. Has anything been proven? Has President Duterte’s connection or involvement in the DDS established?
Many find Matobato’s motive for speaking only now about DDS “interesting,” at the very least. According to him, he only wants to tell the truth. This is interesting because he refused to divulge information on the person/s or group/s who helped him fly to Manila to be a resource person in the Senate investigation.
This seems to be a clear case of selective truth. Matobato was simply telling us that he does not care about anything else because he was simply telling the truth of the DDS and the connection of President Duterte and his son, Davao City Vice Mayor Paolo Duterte to it, yet, he cannot spill out the truth as to who is helping him now. This is even after he claimed that somebody is helping him.
What will serve our country’s interest is the whole, and not partial and selective, truth.
(Dr. Ramon Ricardo A. Roque, CESOI, Diplomate)