Manila: A senior legislator questioned the credibility of a witness who claimed to possess vital information into the alleged vigilante killings in Davao in the past.
Senator Panfilo Lacson, a former national police director general, said statements made by Edgar Matobato were pockmarked with inconsistencies that mar the credibility of the statements he gave before a senate panel on Thursday.
The statements were given by Matobato during a Senate Justice and Human Rights Committee hearing on extrajudicial killings involving recent drug-related killings. The panel is headed by Senator Leila de Lima.
De Lima was apparently trying to link incumbent President Rodrigo Duterte to extrajudicial killings taking place in the Philippines by delving on the latter’s storied past as a no-nonsense administrator who is willing to go to great lengths to keep order.
During the hearing, Matobato, 57, claimed to have taken part in extrajudicial executions of the so-called Davao Death Squad from 1988 to 2013. He said some of the killings were made on direct orders from then Davao City mayor Duterte himself.
Matobato said that he had been recruited into the death squad as a member of the Army-trained militia, the Civilian Armed Forces Geographic Unit (CAFGU), operating in Davao City. The Davao Death Squad was initially known as the “Lambada Boys.”
The shadowy Lambada Boys were comprised of former militiamen, soldiers and guns for hire recruited from the ranks of former members of the communist New Peoples’ Army.
Among the operations handed down to the Lambada Boys were the killing of drug pushers and other criminals.
But Lacson said there appears to be some questions concerning statements made by Matobato. He cited as an example the killing of a certain Sali Makdum in 2002.
Makdum, as claimed by Matobato, was killed inside a mining shaft in Davao City’s MAA district just like other extrajudicial killings his group had undertaken. But as it turned out, the police have no records that the killing took place.
As for the military records of Matobato, officials said there appears to be none.
“We never had anyone by the name of Edgar Matobato in our roster,” said Army Spokesman Col. Benjamin Hao.
The CAFGU is directly under the supervision of the Philippine Army and all members of the militia have records with it.
For his part, Senator Bam Aquino said Matobato’s revelations are worrying.
“It is incumbent for the Senate to determine if there is any truth to his statements since politics can play a role in telling what is true and what are not,” he said.