Police Admit Hostage Drama Mistake   

Police in the Philippines admitted late last week they had blundered in trying to end the hostage drama that resulted in eight tourists being shot dead by a crazed gunman as they sat in terror on a hijacked bus.

•Four hostages, a mother and kids after being freed. Inset: Mendoza.

Commandos fired dozens of bullets into the bus and struck at its windows with sledgehammers as they tried to storm it, but were forced to wait outside helplessly for more than an hour as the  maddened hijacker used the tourists as human shields. As a storm of criticism about police tactics erupted, Manila police commander Leocadio Santiago admitted: ‘We made mistakes.’

‘We saw some obvious shortcomings in terms of capability and tactics used, or the procedure employed, and we are now going to investigate this.’ But an investigation after the bloody event has failed to placate Hong Kong’s government after it watched its nationals – as well as two British citizens who survived – live through hours of terror on the hijacked bus after it had been commandeered by disgruntled policeman Rolando Mendoza, 55.

One of the survivors, who identified herself only as Mrs Leung, said as she scrambled from the bus after Mendoza had finally been shot dead: ‘The police should not have waited so long. ‘There were so many people on the bus but no-one came to our rescue. Why?’

The 12-hour ordeal, which began when Mendoza boarded the bus in a tourist area and demanded to be given a ride. But shortly afterwards the Hong Kong tourists realised they were in trouble when he ordered the driver to lock the door and began waving his M-16 assault rifle around.

‘This tragedy highlights many flaws in the ability of Philippine security forces to hand hostage situations,’ said President Aquino, who came to power two months ago. ‘There are a lot of things that resulted in a tragedy. Obviously we should be improving.’

Tags:  Commando, hostage dram, Manila police commander Leocadio Santiago, Mrs Leung, Philippines police