The Griffin Philippine Military Academy Class of 1955 led by its class president, former AFP vice chief of staff Lt. Gen. Salvador M. Mison, PA (retired) has expressed outrage at ?the current sins of our straying brother officer from the PMA that are directed against our own people, against our own country whom we have sworn to serve, protect and defend.?

In an open letter to the ?Men of PMA? the PMA Class of 1955 reminded PMA alumni that the Honor code ?that says we are not to lie, cheat, steal or tolerate others who do not? is the they must follow not only while they are in the PMA but for life.

The letter said that ?all is not lost? and ?there is glimmer of hope in this national darkness? as the class expressed its full support and encouragement to ?our fellow PMA graduates in the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency especially Marine Major Ferdinand Marcelino and his chief, General Dionisio Santiago.?

The letter signed by Mison and the Class Secretary Col. Romeo A. Solina, PA (retired) said Santiago and Marcelino ?showed their moral strength in facing up to the self-serving and hypocritical elites who decry and question their motives in the performance of their duties with honor.?

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There is growing concern in legal and judicial circles that the Office of the Ombudsman may have unfairly been caught in a major political crossfire in Cebu, and that the current bind facing the Ombudsman?s Central Visayas office may be unjustly exploited by vested interests.

The fear seems based on an apparent orchestrated effort in the Queen City of the South to paint the Office of the Ombudsman in bad light following its recent move to withdraw a couple of graft cases it filed before the Sandiganbayan in connection with the Asean lamppost controversy which rocked the Cebu community in 2007.

There has been a rash of innuendoes and intrigues against the Ombudsman when it told concerned Sandiganbayan Divisions in October last year that ?the prosecution is now in doubt that it can prove its allegations that the lampposts purchase were overpriced.?

And then just before the Christmas break last year, the anti-graft office?s Central Visayas prosecutors reportedly pleaded before Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez to have all related cases now pending before the Sandiganbayan withdrawn ?for further re-investigation.?

And now, all sorts of accusations are being hurled against the Ombudsman for doing what it feels it must in the face of certain realities about this lamppost controversy.

We have never been particularly interested in the politics of Cebu but we feel obliged to put in our two cents? worth since an Office that serves the entire nation?s interest seems to be caught in the exchange of gunfire between powerful political forces in the province. It seems grossly unfair that the integrity of this Office should be put under question simply because it may have failed to cater to the agenda of a political faction in there.

In fairness to the Ombudsman, many political observers are convinced that it was merely caught in a politically motivated hysteria just before the 2007 elections.

And since public opinion in the province appeared then to have favored the filing of charges against some political figures and private contractors, the Cebu office of the anti-graft office may have acted hastily and now wants to review its actions and undo some of them that have been the product of the undue haste.

The view here in Metro Manila is that the Ombudsman?s move to ask for the recall of the cases it filed in the Sandiganbayan in connection with the lamppost brouhaha is based on two important reasons.

  First, there have been news items that government prosecutors are ?apprehensive? over reports that documents obtained from the Bureau of Customs and used as ?evidence? of the alleged overprice are ?spurious and falsified.?

Last we heard, a Cebu-based Customs broker is now in hot water in the wake of a probe on reports that he had concocted the documents pertaining to the importation of the lampposts in an alleged bid to obtain lower customs duties assessment.

So, we cannot blame the government prosecutors for stepping on the brakes in the light of this development. They cannot prosecute a case based on spurious documents being used as evidence. They have to win their case based on ?clear and convincing evidence? that establish guilt ?beyond reasonable doubt.?

Here?s a second reason for the apparent change of heart on the part of the Ombudsman. It appears that many Cebuanos are now loudly wondering whether or not the major embarrassment to which they have been subjected in connection with the lamppost brouhaha is just a case of a blown-out political war.

We were told that media circles and coffee shops in Metro Cebu were reviewing the political events leading up to the lamppost controversy and asking if the allegations concerning overpricing in the purchase of the lampposts were politically ignited fiction rather than fact.

Already, the details of the start of the controversy are being talked about again. For example, a second look is being given to the local government executives who were dragged into the issue and the question being asked is whether or not the lamppost overprice allegations were merely used as election propaganda.

A second look is also being given to the supposed ?whistle-blower,? a certain Crisologo Saavedra. Our Cebu friends pointed to us a recent rash of media opinion pieces in Cebu City which revealed a fact not prominently played out at the start of the lamppost row.

That fact is that Saavedra was reportedly one of the bidders for the multi-million spy camera supply contract for that Asean summit which it failed to bag, leading to a protracted media war with Cebu Governor Gwen Garcia whom he publicly called ?corrupt.?

Now, the question is being asked whether or not Saavedra, whose Pelican/Cebesos company had also offered decorative lampposts to Cebu City, is simply in the habit of getting back at people who disappoint him. It seems that some of the supposed ?evidence? that the Cebu prosecutors used in filing the cases against concerned parties in the lampposts controversy were supplied by Saavedra.

Should the Ombudsman be faulted for wanting to review the quality and integrity of the ?evidence??

We hope that the Ombudsman?s detractors in Cebu and Metro Manila would back off in the meantime and allow it to do its job. It is already under fire from many quarters and that is reason enough for it to take more cautious steps regarding the lamppost issue.

We cannot fault it for perhaps realizing that it has merely been caught in a political crossfire. We do not want it to be used as an unwitting tool of some people?s political agenda against their provincial nemeses.