Evidence vs Parang blast suspect lacking

COTABATO CITY — A state prosecutor has ordered the release from the Maguindanao provincial jail of a key suspect in the Jan. 4 bombing in Parang town that left 22 people dead, for lack of evidence linking him to the crime.

Provincial prosecutor Rodulfo Yamson, in a three-page resolution the other day, said suspect Kusain Taha, alias Omar Ramalan and Commander Bagi-Bagi of the Moro National Liberation Front, did not resemble the man whom witnesses said brought a bomb-laden motorcycle into the packed gymnasium.

Yamson said the witnesses gave conflicting details on why they implicated Taha, a native Iranon, in the bombing.

Community leaders in Parang, a coastal town some 30 kilometers northeast of this city, earlier asked the National Bureau of Investigation to conduct a separate probe on the bombing, convinced that Taha and all other people implicated in the attack were mere "fall guys."

Taha was arrested reportedly without any warrant two weeks ago by soldiers manning a roadblock on a secluded stretch of the Secretary Narciso Ramos Highway in Matanog, Maguindanao.

Non-government organizations and cause-oriented groups are now investigating Taha’s accusations that his military interrogators tortured and electrocuted him to force him to sign a written statement naming the political rivals of Parang’s re-electionist mayor, Vivencio Bataga, as the masterminds of the bombing.

According to personnel of the Maguindanao provincial jail, Taha had injuries and was "blindfolded" with a two-inch packing tape when he was turned over for detention by soldiers from a nearby Army camp.

Bataga, a retired Army colonel, was one of the 71 people wounded in the attack, the worst ever in the history of Parang, a community of mixed Muslim and Christian settlers.

Police earlier tagged a Parang councilor, Abdul Katab, and a certain Suharto Ahmad as the principal suspects in the bombing.

Religious and political leaders in Parang, however, claimed they have information that Katab and Ahmad were both out of town when the bombing occurred.

Katab, who is seeking re-election, hails from Bonggo Island, a known bailiwick of Bataga’s political rivals.

Katab, in an interview with The STAR last week, denied that he was involved in the bombing, claiming that Bataga has been persecuting him for having forged an alliance with a rival political camp.