POLICE responding to a bomb threat at the regional office of the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) failed to conduct a sweep of the building because the regional director did not want to disturb ongoing transactions.
Bomb specialists of the Explosive Ordnance Division (EOD) had to leave without conducting the required inspection procedures-potentially endangering the lives of the building's occupant, police said.
"As a result, we cannot verify whether the bomb threat inside the building is true or not. There may or there may not be a bomb there as of the moment," said PO3 John Paul Villavito, EOD specialist of the Cagayan de Oro Police Office (Cocpo).
Villavito said BIR-Northern Mindanao Director Mustapha Gandarosa barred the EOD men inside the agency's offices located at the Trinidad building, Corrales Avenue, because "he does not want the operations hampered by the search."
"He also said he (Gandarosa) was not convinced of the threat, and that it was not serious enough to warrant a search," Villavito added.
BIR-Northern Mindanao and its local district office occupy the fourth and fifth floors of the building.
It was learned that the regional office of the BIR has no security plan of its own to properly respond to bomb threats.
Police also discovered that no security guard was assigned at an access point leading to its offices located the back the building.
The threat was received by BIR employee Nila Balmosena through a cell phone text message around 8:30 a.m., police said.
"Somebody is bringing something in your building. Please tell everybody, if possible, go home. From concerned citizen," the text message reads. The threat was received from cell phone number 09238987896.
Police said there was reason to send the bomb threat to Balmosena, as she operates the office's public address system, aside from her official job as a computer operator.
"There could be many reasons for a bomb threat. Most often it is to create panic," Villavito said. "But in the absence of a proper search, we will never know."
Though Director Gandarosa's decision contradicts police guidelines in handling bomb threats, Villavito said the decision to evacuate a suspected bomb site remains at the hands of the head of office of a government or private agency.
Nevertheless, the Gandarosa should have allowed a search on the area to verify the truthfulness of the threat, police said.
Trinidad building also houses the regional Philhealth office, the Cooperative Development Authority (CDA) and other government and private agencies.
Ironically, employees of Philhealth at the sixth floor were the first to vacate the building when police arrived.
Other occupants of the building followed suit, while the BIR employees remained ensconced inside their workplace upon Gandorosa's instruction, probers said.
The Philippine National Police (PNP) encourages government and private establishments to adopt their own security and bomb incident plans.
As a matter of policy, PNP also treat all types of bomb threats as real, and must be reported immediately to the police.
