Mutiny leader escapes from court

A captain accused of helping lead hundreds of troops in a failed 2003 mutiny in the Philippines escaped from a court where he was awaiting a hearing on the case today.

Marine Capt Nicanor Faeldon disappeared at the Makati Regional Trial Court in Metropolitan Manila shortly after asking his guard’s permission to buy fruit from a vendor in the court premises, a senior intelligence official said.

In a statement he read on video disk distributed to some reporters, Faeldon said he had hoped he would be proven wrong about President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.

“Instead the events have proven me right,” he said. “She is corrupt and ruthless and she will do anything to stay in power. I leave now to join the fight for a credible government.”

“We are looking for him now. We are going to his known address,” said the senior official.

Asked if the escape had any links to rumours of a coup plot by disgruntled troops, the intelligence official said: “That is what we are still trying to establish.”

Faeldon was one of the core leaders of about 300 troops who in July 2003 occupied the ritzy Oakwood Hotel and a nearby shopping mall in the capital’s financial district. They rigged the area with bombs, but surrendered peacefully after about 20 hours.

The government said that action was part of a larger coup conspiracy, but the officers said they were only demanding the resignation of Arroyo and other officials over alleged corruption.

Faeldon escaped as the military and police are supposed to be on the highest state of alert.

Arroyo has been haunted in recent months by calls for her to step down, and coup rumours that have swirled since June rose to a new crescendo in the days before her departure Sunday for a regional summit in Kuala Lumpur.

She survived an impeachment attempt in September when her majority allies in the House of Representatives junked three impeachment bids on a technicality.

A retired general called for Arroyo’s overthrow last night, declaring himself the leader of an interim government.

But officials were not rattled by the move, calling Gen Fortunato Abat’s declaration “pathetic.”