MANILA, Philippines — After months of absence from the Senate, one among Senator Ronald dela Rosa’s first official acts was to appoint his mistah and fellow former police common Mao Aplasca as Senate Sergeant-at-Arms.
It will not be the primary time Dela Rosa, who led the Philippine Nationwide Police (PNP) at first of former president Rodrigo Duterte’s drug warfare, had vouched for his Philippine Army Academy (PMA) classmate.
“I knew personally Common Aplasca since we have been each members of Philippine Army Academy Class of ’86, however unluckily he graduated in 1987,” stated Dela Rosa in July 2025, on the opening of the twentieth Congress.
Luck was fast to seek out Aplasca within the PNP, not less than after his mistah was appointed prime cop in 2016, and members of the 1986 class shortly turned the ruling class within the PNP. Regardless of being turned again – or “delayed by a 12 months,” in PMA parlance – he went on to carry key posts till he retired in 2020 as a three-star common.
Ties run deep
Aplasca and Dela Rosa’s ties run deep and near the guts.
Contained in the academy, the senator recalled in 2025, Aplasca “helped [him] graduate” and “surpass [our] plebe-hood” by simply being round.
“We have been each coming from the provinces of Davao and we each… didn’t know how one can converse Tagalog once we have been in PMA,” Dela Rosa stated in endorsing his mistah as head of Senate safety in 2025.
4 many years later, the 2 Davaoeños’ ties are on the middle of what has been, so far, an unprecedented three days of drama, motion, and even some comedy in probably the most august halls of the Senate.
Since his swift return as chief of safety for the Senate this week, Aplasca has watched over two lockdowns, a firefight with operatives from authorities, and the early morning “escape” of his mistah who has an arrest warrant issued towards him by the Worldwide Prison Court docket (ICC) over his function within the Duterte drug warfare.
Aplasca has been suspended by the Ombudsman.
‘We’re arresting somebody’
On the night of Wednesday, Might 13, Dela Rosa went stay on Fb and known as on the general public’s assist as he claimed that each the Nationwide Bureau of Investigation (NBI) and the police would come to arrest him.
Round 7 pm, Aplasca advised reporters that the Senate could be locked down and that they’d 5 minutes to go away the Senate constructing, in the event that they select to take action. He’d advised reporters that they have been going to execute an arrest, however didn’t give extra particulars.
A chasearound triggered by a sighting of Dela Rosa and a few herding by Aplasca’s Workplace of the Senate Sergeant-at-Arms (OSAA) adopted, and it was 7:44 pm.
At this level, Aplasca gathered each OSAA personnel and Senate perimeter forces – members of the Police Safety and Safety Group and Marines – in entrance of the second-floor elevator.
The Marines have been in commonplace gear, together with bulletproof vests and helmets, and have been carrying firearms. OSAA personnel, in blue-gray polo barongs, have been carrying protecting vests and carrying their firearms.
Aplasca, additionally carrying a protecting vest and carrying what seemed like a CZ Scorpion Evo 3, led the regular, calm stroll of OSAA personnel, Marines, and police to the correct aspect of the constructing’s second flooring, which results in the connecting bridge between the rented Senate constructing and the primary GSIS constructing.
A firefight quickly adopted, with journalists both speeding out of the constructing or taking cowl within the press workplace space.
The NBI, reportedly tasked with securing the GSIS aspect of the compound, and Malacañang later stated it was the OSAA, and Aplasca particularly, who fired the primary warning shot, prompting the NBI to fireplace its personal warning shot.
Aplasca’s model
Over DZRH on Friday, Might 15, Aplasca stated the firing of a warning shot was a part of the OSAA’s guidelines of engagement. He stated OSAA personnel couldn’t enable themselves to be harm and needed to insist that the NBI stand down and put down their arms.
Aplasca claimed that the NBI brokers refused to place down their weapons.
That is Aplasca’s model of occasions and his reasoning for his actions, as advised to reporters the day after on Thursday, Might 14: his determination to spherical up the Senate’s perimeter safety forces and the OSAA was not meant to protect Dela Rosa from a supposed arrest, however was “a part of implementing the safety measures of the Senate.”
Aplasca stated senators have been involved for his or her security after receiving calls that allegedly urged them to go away the Senate as a result of one thing large was about to occur.
“Naalarma na rin kami… dahil sa mga reviews, eh, naghanda po kami (We have been alarmed too, so we ready),” he stated.
“Hindi po kami pupunta doon na hindi kami nakahanda sa giyera (We might not go there with out making ready for a warfare),” he added.
Their evaluation, primarily based on actions captured by the Senate’s CCTV cameras, was that the armed personnel who turned out to be NBI, have been a menace.
As Aplasca was narrating his model of the evening’s occasions, it turned out the world had already been processed. Media have been later allowed nearer to the scene of the confrontation, however the glass home windows had already been barricaded, any casings eliminated, and markings left by Scene of the Crime Operatives cleared.
Requested what he thought in regards to the Might 13 incident — unprecedented within the comparatively younger historical past of the present Philippine Senate — Aplasca selected to not share his ideas or emotions, however as an alternative spoke about his shock at being reinstated as Senate Sergeant-at-Arms.
A number of stints
Each newly-elected Senate President Alan Peter Cayetano and Dela Rosa invited him to return over to the Senate from the Fee on Appointments, the place he served as head of safety.
He didn’t converse to Cayetano and had a fast chat with Dela Rosa, who advised him to attend a little bit. On the Senate flooring, senators have been already deliberating his appointment as performing Senate Sergeant-at-Arms.
In line with public authorities paperwork and information reviews, Aplasca has served as a senior official in Batangas, the Police Regional Workplace in Davao, earlier than serving beneath Police Regional Workplace VI in Western Visayas.
He earned his first star and served as director of the PNP’s Aviation Safety Group from 2016 to 2017, throughout which he was tasked with resolving the so-called “tanim-bala” controversy, the place passengers could be caught — and probably face prices — after bullets have been discovered of their baggage.
Aplasca was then appointed regional police chief for Calabarzon earlier than occurring to carry two key management roles in Camp Crame — as a two-star director of operations and three-star deputy chief of operations (DCO).
Upon retirement, Aplasca joined the Workplace for Transportation Safety (OTS) beneath the Division of Transportation. He was later designated Sergeant-at-Arms of the Home of Representatives within the 18th Congress. He resigned in 2021.
In 2022, he was first nominee for Avid Builders of Energetic Nation’s Citizenry In direction of Empowered Philippines or Abante Pilipinas, which garnered 85,173 votes, or roughly 0.24% of voters who engaged within the party-list elections. The final party-list to safe a seat within the 2022 elections obtained round 236,929 votes.
In 2022, he returned to OTS by advantage of an appointment from President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. This time he was the workplace’s administrator and held the rank of undersecretary.
Aplasca discovered himself in sizzling water in 2023, when then-Home speaker and presidential cousin Martin Romualdez known as for his resignation following a scandal involving airport safety personnel caught on CCTV swallowing $300 value of payments allegedly stolen from a departing passenger. Aplasca stop in 2023.
He returned to authorities in 2025, as Senate Sergeant-at-Arms when the twentieth Congress opened.
Bato’s ‘sacrifice’
Aplasca doesn’t appear to be bothered by Dela Rosa’s early-morning escape neither is he involved that this was seemingly not stopped or unable to be stopped — both by OSAA, or the police, or the Marines detailed to the Senate.
As a substitute, he’s unhappy. “Malungkot nga po na umalis siya dito. Kasi dito, meron akong management para protektahan si Sen. Bato. Eh, sa labas, hindi ko alam kung anong mangyayari (I’m unhappy he left. Right here, I’ve management to guard Senator Bato. Exterior, I don’t know what may occur),” he advised reporters on Might 14.
He had already established a routine of types within the three nights Dela Rosa spent contained in the Senate. At round 1 am, he’d make his solution to wherever Dela Rosa was. “Binibisita ko po si Sen Bato as a part of my job. Kung mayroong beneath protecting custody, lalo na’t kaklase ko po siya sa PMA, eh half po ng aking obligation na bisitahin si Sen Bato,” he stated.
(I go to Senator dela Rosa as a part of my job. If anybody is beneath protecting custody, particularly since he’s my classmate within the PMA, then it’s a part of my obligation to go to him.)
Dela Rosa had hunkered down within the Senate to keep away from arrest stemming from an ICC warrant. It isn’t a proper safety codified in Philippine legislation, however a courtesy sometimes prolonged to members of the legislature, beneath which they don’t seem to be arrested inside Senate premises — even when senators up to now, together with those that opposed former president Duterte, have been topic to the service of warrants contained in the Senate.
From his visits and possibly by way of Dela Rosa’s repeated media interviews, Aplasca stated he additionally felt sorry (“naawa,” in Fillipino) for his PMA classmate.
“Nakikita ko po talagang mabigat sa kanyang… Naririnig naman yung kanyang expression, ‘yung kanyang frustration na sinasabi niya na it’s fairly a sacrifice,” stated Aplasca. It was at this level within the transient interview with media that his voice cracked.
(You possibly can see how heavy that is on him. You possibly can hear his expressions, his frustration that it’s been fairly a sacrifice.)
It’s a sentiment that echoes by way of some components of the PMA alumni world — that it’s unlucky to see these occasions transpire round a retired official who had devoted his total life to uniformed service. That the service included Duterte’s bloody drug warfare is a element that’s typically ignored of those discussions.
Aplasca stated he was not involved with Dela Rosa after that 1 am go to. Dela Rosa and his shut ally and buddy, the motion star Senator Robin Padilla, additionally apparently exited the Senate premises with neither resistance nor fanfare.
“Ang report sa akin, from the parking, parang tuloy-tuloy, regular sila. Naglakad lang naman, sumakay, tuloy-tuloy lumabas,” stated Aplasca, referring to Dela Rosa and Padilla’s actions main as much as their exit from the Senate within the wee hours of the morning on Might 14.
(The report that reached me is that from the parking space, every little thing was regular. They walked, rode the car, and left.)
Identical to Bato
In the identical method that Dela Rosa appears to consider he did no unsuitable within the drug warfare, Aplasca, in his public statements, maintained that his actions on Might 13 have been warranted.
He has stated the NBI ought to have coordinated with the Senate their actions close to the Senate constructing, even when it was inside GSIS. He has additionally harassed that the NBI brokers have been staying on the Senate aspect of the compound.
Whereas he stated they have been ready for “warfare,” he additionally advised reporters he didn’t count on an precise firefight within the confrontation with the NBI.
On Friday, he advised a radio program that the OSAA had to date been unable to seek out CCTV footage displaying the actions of OSAA and Marines in the course of the Might 13 incident.
The identical day, the Ombudsman ordered him preventively suspended for six months with out pay. – Rappler.com
