PSSG ESTILLORE, ARACILEE L (PSJLC 2023-01 BRAVO)

FIRST RESPONDER
Instructor: JONATHAN MACA

MANILA HOSTAGE CRISIS ON AUGUST 23, 2010

DISCUSSION:

One fine morning of August 23, 2010, the country experienced the most tragic
hostage crisis in a bus at Quirino Grandstand Manila involving a dismissed police
officer, 55 year old Rolando Mendoza. Aboard the bus were 20 tourists from Hongkong,
3 Filipino tour guides and the driver. The breathtaking hostage drama lasted 11 hours
with a tragic and heartbreaking end wherein nine individuals were dead including the
hostage taker and the rest were injured and traumatized.

Accordingly, former policeman Rolando Mendoza was a well decorated and hard-
working officer. He had received lot of awards during his tenure. But he was dismissed
from service because of an alleged extortion and drug violation stripping him off from all
the benefits of retirement which is only a year away. In much frustration of feeling
oppressed, he did his way to get the attention of the government officials in order his
voice be heard and to be reinstated back to police service.

On the other hand, the police force was immediate to respond the situation, a
hostage crisis management team was created to handle the situation. The SWAT team,
Snipers, medical team, and other coordinating agencies were taking their posts ready to
respond if needed. At first, the situation runs smoothly and as the hostage taker
released some 8 hostages giving hope to everyone that things are going well.
Negotiations continued but unfortunately table turns when brother of Mendoza came in
the picture unsolicited. The media coverage that reveals everything that happens in the
ground including the positions of snipers. The situation starts out of hand because the
hostage taker saw everything going on the ground, the actions taken by the police force
because of the wide coverage made by the media since the bus they were in was
equipped with a television. Some other reports made by the media during the live
coverage were unconfirmed information as they were competing for the best coverage
of the crisis. Enraged Mendoza, he threw several fires inside the bus that caused the
lives of some hostages.
Lastly, lapses in handling the situation are everywhere during that response and
it served as an opportunity for the government to dig deeply its capability in handling
crisis like that. How ready our law enforcement base on knowledge, skills, and
equipments.

CONCLUSION:

In general, hostage crisis response made on that incident was a failure. I must
say that the situation was mishandled by the ground commander because he was not
able to control the happenings in the ground. They focused solely on the negotiation
process. The have not questioned why the hostage taker knows all their actions on the
ground. They totally lost control over the media who were competing for the best live
coverages revealing critical information on air including the existence and positions of
snipers. The radio station who was taking live interview with Mendoza, the politicians
who were also taking their actions as to respond the situation making direct contact with
the hostage taker while negotiations were ongoing, are the contributing factor of its
failure.

RECCOMENDATION:

Handling Hostage crisis takes a lot of hard work, skills, and knowledge on the law
enforcement because in situation like this, time, timing and tactics are essential. In this
situation, they should not change the Ground Commander in the middle of the incident
or while the hostage taking was in their most tension progress. They should allow the
ground commander to take charge all the actions to be made, meaning all the outside
instructions from higher personalities should reach first the ground commander in order
to have control of the situation. The media should be handled properly in times like this
although it is their job to take coverage but hostage crisis should be considered a
special case.