We go back, yet again, to our call for authorities to crack down on the illegal suppliers of guns and ammunition across the country.
It would be a strategic accomplishment, should it come to pass, because it would greatly help in ensuring no exchange of gunfire between drug syndicates and the police during anti-drug operations.
A more gun-free society would also make it harder for police to matter-of-factly say that the people they kill during anti-drug operations perished because they put up a fight.
This is the explanation the police have issued following the series of shootings in Cebu and Talisay cities this week that ended with a body haul of at least 9. Those who perished died because they fought back with their guns.
The problem with this defense is two-fold.
Foremost is the difficulty of confirming the assertion through eyewitness accounts coupled with the reluctance of the police to admit that they may have used a disproportionate level of force in the effort to collar suspects.
Heroic and rare is the law enforcer who volunteers information that could incriminate him and cost him his job, years in jail, and a fortune in litigation fees.
Second is the technical protection of the police from being held accountable through agencies like the Commission on Human Rights.
Central Visayas Police Director Debold Sinas may say as many times as he wants that cops are open to being investigated.
But in fact Malacañang has a gag order in force, preventing police personnel from testifying to independent investigators or turning over documents to them minus police clearance.
Unless the order effectively shielding the police from being accountable is lifted, any declaration of openness to probe is mere posturing, and we go back to the responsibility of law enforcers to disarm suspected criminal elements long before the scenario of a gun fight with the police becomes possible.
Let us see how well the “nanlaban” or fighting back excuse holds when the police will look absurd claiming pushback from the unarmed as a reason for shooting them dead.
Today the excuse sounds plausible, but minus transparency highly suspect.
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