25 NPA hit squads out to get Isabela governor

SAN MARIANO, Isabela — The New People’s Army (NPA) has deployed 25 hit squads to carry out the order of self-exiled Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) leader Jose Ma. Sison to get Isabela Gov. Faustino Dy Jr. at all cost, a ranking female leader of the regional underground movement said.

"Certainly, we will come and get him," Ka Chat, who introduced herself as the secretary-general of the CPP-NPA’s Cagayan Valley Regional Committee, told select newsmen at a rebel camp in a remote village here.

Ka Chat said it is just a matter of time that Sison’s order would be carried out and that only a single bullet would end Dy’s "anti-people" programs.

"The people wanted to stop these but they are powerless to do it, that’s why the NPA is taking the burden of (stopping these projects) on their behalf," she said.

Ka Chat virtually confirmed earlier military intelligence reports that Sison has instructed the three NPA units in Isabela — the Benito Tesorio Command and the Filomena Asuncion and Reynaldo Piñol Fronts — to liquidate Dy and other provincial officials.

The NPA hit list also reportedly includes Vice Gov. Santiago Respicio, provincial prosecutor Anthony Foz, schools division superintendent Benito Tumamao, election supervisor Erwin Valeroso and a number of town mayors.

The three NPA units in the province have 293 armed regulars, 25 hit squads and 4,469 mass-based supporters, according to intelligence reports.

Meanwhile, Brig. Gen. Ernesto Lumang Jr., assistant commander of the Army’s 5th Infantry Division based in Gamu town, advised Isabela mayors to be security-conscious amid the serious threats from communist rebels.

"We have A-1 intelligence reports that a number of local elective officials are in their hit list," Lumang said in a briefing for the provincial peace and order council in Aurora town yesterday.

Lumang, however, gave assurance that the 5th ID has been doing its part to eliminate the insurgents’ threats in its areas of responsibility that include the whole of Cagayan Valley, the Ilocos region and part of the Cordilleras.

Acting on these threats, the League of Municipal Mayors, led by Aurora Mayor William Uy, has passed a resolution asking Philippine National Police chief Director General Hermogenes Ebdane Jr. to issue each of the mayors a special permit to carry firearms outside their residences.

Uy said the issuance of these firearm permits is the only way they can thwart attempts on their lives.

Dy has thrown his support behind the mayors’ request, saying that he would personally follow it up with Ebdane.

Senior Superintendent Nelson Nario, provincial police director, earlier said that only Gov. Dy, Uy, Rep. Faustino Dy III and Cauayan City Mayor Caesar Dy have so far been issued permits to carry firearms outside their residences.