July 26, 2003, AsiaTimes, A ticking time bomb walks to freedom, by Marco Garrido,

July 26, 2003, AsiaTimes, A ticking time bomb walks to freedom, by Marco Garrido,

MANILA - How did Fathur Rohman al-Ghozi escape from the Philippine National Police (PNP) prison compound last week? It would appear that he simply walked out.

On July 14, the Indonesian Jema'ah Islamiyah (JI) bomb expert, along with two other inmates, members of the Abu Sayyaf bandit group, apparently unlocked their cell with a set of spare keys, relocked it, walked out of the jail building and through the prison gates, and used a small guardhouse to vault over the compound wall. Of the four guards detailed in al-Ghozi's area, one was sleeping; another was out shopping. Nevertheless, the guards managed to register their hourly head count as complete.

It was the inmate remaining in al-Ghozi's cell - apparently left behind because of bad blood with one of the Filipino escapees - who notified the guards of the escape. They refused to believe him, however, because the cell remained padlocked. Only when a new set of guards arrived five hours later was the escape discovered; and only hours after that - allowing al-Ghozi a full half-day head start - was the news reported to Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. She had just met with Australian Prime Minister John Howard to discuss joint counter-terrorism initiatives.

The bomb maker

According to Rohan Gunaratna, author of Inside Al Qaeda: Global Network of Terror, al-Ghozi, 32, was the most important JI member in custody. He has ties to other senior JI figures, including Indonesian cleric and alleged JI mastermind Abu Bakar Ba'asyir and Riduan Isamudin, otherwise known as Hambali, Osama bin Laden's suspected point man in Asia. Al-Ghozi studied under Ba'asyir, trained in Afghanistan with al-Qaeda, and was recruited by Hambali for the foiled plot to bomb the US, Australian, and Israeli embassies in Singapore in 2001. He collaborated with Muklis Yunos, who claims to be a subcommander in the separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front, to engineer the December 2000 bombings in Manila that killed 22 people. He also admitted to detonating a bomb that nearly killed the Philippine ambassador to Indonesia in August 2000.

Al-Ghozi was perhaps also the most dangerous JI member in custody. He is notorious for his bomb-making expertise. Gunaratna warns that "he is the most experienced, the best trained, and the most well motivated" among JI operatives. "He is the one man who can put together an operation in such a short time." Furthermore, he is elusive - in appearance unassuming and fluent in several Philippine regional languages - and connected, both in terms of confederates and supplies.

Dr Zachary Abuza, author of Tentacles of Terror: Al Qaeda's Southeast Asian Network, writes that al-Ghozi founded in the Philippines "a major logistics cell for the network responsible for acquiring explosives, guns, and other equipment". His arrest last January led authorities to a cache of more than a tonne of explosives, which, he claimed, were to be used for attacks in Southeast Asia. Security experts say his escape has heightened the threat of terrorism across the region.

Incompetence, corruption, or conspiracy?

"For someone who is so important to have just escaped, how is this possible?" asked Andrew Tan, a security analyst at the Singapore-based Institute for Defense and Strategic Studies. His incredulity is a common reaction.

The incompetence involved in al-Ghozi's escape is astonishing. His cell door was so shoddily constructed that it could be opened by lifting it from the hinges without having to break the padlock. Not that he had even to undertake such heavy lifting, however, since it would seem that he and his confederates were somehow able to acquire spare keys.

It is a further question why al-Ghozi was housed in the insecure floor of an insecure prison compound. It would appear that he was transferred from the more secure ground floor of the Intelligence Group (IG) building to the laxer second floor upon orders from one Superintendent Reuben Galban, chief of the PNP Foreign Intelligence Liaison Office. Galban says he needed easier access to al-Ghozi in order to cross-examine his story against that of another notorious detainee, Muklis Yunos. Yet Yunos was kept on the first floor of the IG building. It was on the second floor that al-Ghozi was able to consult with inmate Abu Ali, formerly of the Abu Sayyaf and a janitor on the floor. Ali provided him information on the layout of the compound.

Camp Crame, the PNP compound where the IG building is located, is infamous for being porous. Al-Ghozi has not been the only high-profile escapee. Just last year Faisal Marohombsar, leader of the kidnap-for-ransom Pentagon Gang, and drug lord Henry Tan bolted Crame. (Tan sawed off the iron window grills of his detention cell). In 1995, Khaddafi Janjalani, now the leader of the Abu Sayyaf, also managed to flee.

There is, however, a fine line between incompetence and corruption; and the sheer scale of incompetence apparently involved makes police connivance seem an easier explanation to swallow. Philippine Senator Rodolfo Biazon has said that al-Ghozi's escape cannot be blamed entirely on incompetence. "I don't want to accept that conclusion. So the second possibility is collusion because of payment. This is dangerous".

But it is an explanation not without evidence. All four guards on duty at the time of the escape failed lie-detector tests. One guard, the one who supposedly asleep, even alleged that they (the guards) were being set up by higher-ups to take the fall. Superintendent Galban also failed the polygraph. His vehicle was seen loitering around the IG compound on the evening of the escape. The sentry logbook notes that he left the compound twice that night between 11pm and 2am. Before being summoned by the investigatory committee, Galban had booked himself on a flight to the United States.

There is another lead: one caller to the Radio Mindanao Network alleged that three-star general and Police Director for Operations Virtus Gil received a US$10 million bribe to deliver al-Ghozi to an Indonesian group identified as al-Rahman. While this sum may be fantastic, it certainly has the effect of putting to shame the government bounty of P10 million ($500,000) on al-Ghozi's head.

Conspiracy theories are also afloat, with perhaps the most current (if not the most credible) being that former PNP chief and opposition presidential candidate Panfilo Lacson engineered al-Ghozi's escape in order to embarrass the Arroyo administration. The timing of the escape was, after all, impeccable, with the Australian prime minister in the country to sign an accord that included A$5 million ($3.3 million) in counter-terrorism aid to the Philippines.

However, the suspicion extending willy-nilly through the various levels of the PNP may be more a sign of organizational fractiousness than of widespread collusion. The head of the PNP's internal investigation, Chief Superintendent Eduardo Matillano, is a possible contender for the role of PNP chief. His competition largely includes Lacson allies such as Virtus Gil - some of the same people on whom suspicion has been (coincidentally?) directed. In any case, establishing where incompetence ends and corruption begins is made no easier with shadowy internal politics as the backdrop.

Fallout in international confidence

President Arroyo has responded to al-Ghozi's escape by taking decisive action aimed at reasserting government control over the situation. The PNP has launched perhaps the largest manhunt in Philippine history. Sixty-three special tracker teams consisting of more than 5,000 police and supplemented by 300,000 security guards and peace officers from some 42,000 villages nationwide have been deployed in the search for the terrorist.

More than just finding al-Ghozi, however, Arroyo has aimed with perhaps even greater intent at purging the organization that allowed his escape. She has called on the PNP leadership to "shape up or ship out" and threatened a "top-to-bottom revamp" of the organization. To date, 20 police and intelligence officers have been fired; the four guards on duty at the time of al-Ghozi's escape face criminal charges - infidelity in the custody of prisoners - and six others face administrative charges. She has rejected PNP Chief Hermogenes Edbane's verbal offer to resign - at least for now - and instead has ordered him to redeem himself by recapturing al-Ghozi. She has commissioned an independent probe of the escape and ordered the construction of a new, suffice to say more secure, prison building for high-profile detainees. To an extent, the swiftness of the action now being taken smacks of action being taken too late, but in terms of the fallout in international confidence, it is certainly too late.

Both the United States and Australia have renewed their travel advisories against the Philippines. The spokesperson for the US ambassador to the Philippines has called the incident "a big setback" in the fight against terrorism. US President George W Bush has reportedly been advised to cancel his scheduled visit to the country.

In perhaps the most articulate condemnation of the escape, the Sydney Morning Herald has wrung its hands over the ease with which terrorists flourish in the Philippines and how this "puts the rest of the region at risk". The Herald went on to question the wisdom of Australia's anti-terror investment in the Philippines: "... as long as the security forces and bureaucracy of the Philippines and other nations in the region remain vulnerable to corruption, no amount of aid for specialist police training can guarantee the anti-terrorist effort".

Likewise, al-Ghozi's escape might also suggest new priority areas for the war on terror. Some part of the enormous amount of aid being funneled to developing countries such as the Philippines largely to build military and intelligence capacities might be more wisely directed toward developmental ends such as building institutions and law-and-order capabilities. Such aid would help weak countries not only catch and keep terrorists but grow strong enough to deter terrorism from taking root and flourishing within their borders.