Armed Forces Southern Command chief Lt. Gen. Alberto Braganza said 11-year-old Sonny Boy Hamac succumbed Monday night to multiple infections while being treated at the Camp Navarro General Hospital for third-degree burns in his body.
Hamac was one of the seven blast victims among the 26 wounded following the bomb explosion that ripped through the lower deck of M/V Doña Ramona last Sunday at the wharf of Lamitan, Basilan.
Hamac was the son of an Army trooper detailed as a sea marshal on the ill-fated ferry.
President Arroyo personally sent Secretary Jesus Dureza, presidential adviser on Mindanao affairs, to assess the situation and offer financial assistance to the victims being treated in two hospitals here.
Among those seriously wounded are husband and wife Renato and Zenaida Sestina with their two children, Clark Anthony, aged nine, and Shareen, aged eight.
The others were identified as Juan Joseph and Eduardo Torres.
Dureza was met with cries of gratitude from the young Shareen at the Zamboanga City Medical Center after he announced financial assistance would be extended by the President to the blast victims.
Shareen sustained severe burns to her face, hands and legs. Doctors pronounced the young girl in stable condition.
On the other hand, Dureza cited the initial report made by Braganza that an improvised explosive device (IED) was used in the bombing.
Dureza said the bomb did not release fragments. "The bomb was meant to inflict burns on the victims," he said.
Representing the President, Dureza visited Hamac’s wake at the Villa Funeral Homes.
"His only wish was to go back to school," the child’s grieving mother, Marites, told Dureza and reporters.
She narrated how her son told her not to worry even as he fought against the pain. She added she could not accept seeing her son’s charred body and prayed for justice for all the blast victims.
Although no one has claimed responsibility for the blast, authorities said there are indications the bandit group Abu Sayyaf engineered the bombing.
The Philippine National Police (PNP) said they are looking into three possible motives behind the blast.
Reports reaching the PNP headquarters in Camp Crame, Quezon City said local police investigators are pursuing motives of terrorism, sabotage and extortion, and business rivalry.
Veteran intelligence officials, however, ruled out the possibility of business rivalry since M/V Doña Ramona does not have any rival ferry servicing the Lamitan-Zamboanga City route.
A police official said terrorism remains the strongest possible motive.
The official disclosed a police task force headed by Chief Superintendent Sukarno Ikbala is now focusing on terrorism and the Abu Sayyaf as most likely culprits in the blast.
"They (the bombers) are the Abu Sayyaf group based in Basilan. They used a low-explosive device due to lack of funds. They put the explosives in the kitchen thinking that LPG (liquefied petroleum gas) tanks in the vessel would serve to ignite and burn the entire ship," the official noted.
Investigators are also pursuing a lead based on statements made by witnesses that they saw a man place a box atop the counter of the ship’s canteen and leave hastily before it exploded.
PNP chief Director General Arturo Lomibao said an artist’s sketch of the suspect would be released as soon as the investigation was completed.
Lomibao said investigators have interviewed some of the victims, who are still in the hospital, to complete the sketch.
Meanwhile, another improvised explosive device exploded in front of a bakery in Cotabato the other night.
Police said there were no casualties or injuries in the incident which took place in front of a bakery owned by a certain Tammy Baluyot in Kabacan, Cotabato. — With Cecille Suerte Felipe