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By Ric R. Puod, Reporter
They were promised immortality by the man they
called the “Divine Master.” And on that night of June 18,
2002, the promise was brought to the test on Dinagat Island off
Surigao del Norte–16 members of the Philippine Benevolent
Missionary Association (PBMA) lay dead for the cult leader Ruben
Ecleo Jr., whose family holds awesome religious and political power
on the island.
Ecleo faces parricide charges before the Cebu
City Regional Trial Court Branch 23 for allegedly murdering his
third wife, Alona Bacolod, on January 6 last year.
Much may be puzzling about Alona’s death, but
accusations by her family point to Ecleo as the suspect.
Alona’s constant nagging about Ecleo’s addiction to
methamphetamine hydrochloride, or shabu, had reportedly led him to
murder her.
That incident tested even more the faith of PBMA
members on Dinagat when Ecleo’s armed men fought authorities in a
fierce battle to prevent their “Divine Master” and “Supreme
President” from being arrested.
“This only shows that nobody is above the law.
We cannot hide from the law,” said Sen. Robert Barbers, recalling
the event that revealed the ugly side of Dinagat Island, where the
Ecleos have virtual control. Barbers, seeking ways to press
for Ecleo’s surrender, has been the family’s political ally in
the province since he entered politics. Efforts to make Ecleo
surrender took more than five months because of the authorities’
indifference to crimes involving powerful politicians. Ruben
Ecleo Jr. himself had been a mayor of San Jose town. Ruben’s
brother, Allan II, succeeded him. Allan I, a twin brother, is
also a mayor of Dinagat municipality. The family’s political
influence extends from that island to the House of Representatives,
where their mother–Congresswoman Glenda Ecleo–is a member of the
Committee on Appropriation.
But as the Bacolod murder case shook the
PBMA’s foundation, Barbers and a number of congressmen again
raised the issue of private armed groups on Dinagat Island, a clamor
that has never led to a congressional inquiry into the failure of
the law banning private armed groups. “No, the law is not
toothless on this,” Barbers said, noting that the Philippine
National Police hesitates to disarm Ecleo’s followers.
The Crusade Against Violence, looking for ways
to question the government’s policy on private armies, wrote to
then Rep. Antonio Abaya sometime last year. The group asked the
House to inquire into Alona’s murder, and initiated the filing of
charges of obstruction of justice, illegal possession of firearms
and abuse of power of authority against Rep. Glenda Ecleo. “Abaya
never acted on that,” Thelma Chiong, the Crusade’s vice
president for the Visayas, told The Times. “The incident
could have been avoided because she has virtual control of all the
people and police on Dinagat,” an island inhabited by more than
100,000 people. Ninety percent of them are believed to be members of
the PBMA.
For several years since the Marcos regime, armed
groups had been outlawed. Yet they continue to exist and pose
security threats to the people. And when violence like this
erupts, says Carina Agarao, president of the Crusade, “it is
always very difficult to win in a case against a politician.” The
Crusade helped the Bacolod family bring the case to court. Ecleo,
besides being charged with murdering his wife, is also suspected of
committing separate crimes on the side–that of ordering the serial
killings of Alona’s brother, Ben; father Elpidio; mother Rosalia;
and sister Evelyn. Alona’s younger brother, Ricky, though
seriously injured, survived the attack. He is in the custody of the
Central Intelligence and Detection Group, according to Chiong.
Ben was said to be the vital witness to the
parricide case against Ecleo, and to the killing of 11 “White
Guerreros” years ago on Dinagat, which he said he did on Ecleo’s
orders.
Nobody has owned responsibility for the Cebu
killings. The Bacolods’ assailant was shot dead by pursuing
policemen near the Subangdaku police station in Mandaue City. Chiong
said not even the brains behind the serial killings has owned up to
them. “The police have never filed a case against Ecleo for the
Cebu killings,” Chiong said.
Representative Ecleo offered an out-of-court
settlement to the victim’s family, which Agarao says is a clear
admission of guilt that only the country’s justice system could
prove, however snail-paced the process may take, because “that’s
how the system for the powerful politicians works.”
Now the 48-year-old Ecleo, spreading his
spiritual charisma inside the Bagong Buhay Rehabilitation Center in
Cebu, hopes that his lawyer could bail him out, at least in a
parricide case that has been filed in court. Orlando Salatandre,
Ecleo’s legal counsel, says the authorities committed “fatal
mistakes” in handling vital evidence. He intends to reveal this
through a witness at the resumption of a cross-examination for the
petition to bail next week.
Owing to accusations leveled against the
“Supreme President,” scores of PBMA members have slipped in
droves out of Dinagat to nearby provinces. The number of PMBA
members significantly declined even in other areas of the country
and abroad. “Maybe they are ashamed of what happened to our
“Divine Master,” admits Antonio Ancajas, PBMA president for
Metro Manila. “But they are not loyal to the PBMA, and we
anticipated their move.” No exact figure, however, has been given
on the number of members who have broken away from the cult.
The loyalists regard Ecleo as Christ, a living
god that only an Ecleotic charisma could drive people into such a
brink of delusion, retired Bishop Miguel Cinches, SVD, hinted in a
media interview last year.
Ancajas believes Ecleo was used by the Holy
Spirit to heal and drive away evil forces. “Can anybody fault us
if we regard him as our living god? If Christ can perform miracles,
so does Ecleo,” he told The Times.
In that tragic incident last year, Ecleo had
been found positive for shabu. He is a musician, a rocker who would
not hesitate to use drugs, said Ancajas. And a man who had three
women in the past, including Alona, whose murder cries out for
justice.
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