Zamboanga mayor gunned down in fiesta attack

ZAMBOANGA CITY — A barangay fiesta in Zamboanga Sibugay turned violent when unidentified armed men fired at a group of local candidates who were onstage shortly before midnight Wednesday, killing a woman mayor and wounding seven others, three of them councilors.

The killing of Mayor Denia Tora Tapodok of Malangas town came six days after the former mayor, Jessie Postero, 51, was shot dead by a lone assassin in Bonifacio, Misamis Occidental.

Tapodok was delivering a speech onstage in Barangay Payag, flanked by municipal and village officials and some relatives, when the armed men peppered them with M-16 bullets, according to Col. Juvenal Narcise, spokesman of the Army’s First Infantry Division and Task Force Comet.

Tapodok, who belonged to the Nationalist People’s Coalition, died on the spot. Wounded were councilors Dodong Banekiao, Emma Guevarra and Sotero Remanod, and civilians Florante Basarte, Rolleta Basarte, Reynante Basarte and Guilnerd Bangkiao.

The attackers fled from the scene as the crowd scampered for safety.