A residence certificate (cedula) found in the man’s body identified him as Akman Kapuyak. For its part, the Army, in a statement, named him as Kurato Tapuyak, alias Anton.
Lt. Col. Franklin del Prado, press relations chief of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, said Kapuyak and his men opened fire first as soldiers and policemen were approaching their lair in Barangay Kayaga, triggering a running gunbattle.
Kapuyak and 17 of his men were spotted at the boundary of Buluan and Datu Paglas towns where military operations were concentrated in the past two weeks.
The military said Kapuyak’s henchmen managed to escape during the firefight.
Kapuyak was implicated in more than 30 kidnappings, including the abduction of three-year-old Chester Jurlador, grandson of a Tacurong businessman, in late 2002.
Police also linked him to the gunslaying of the Tacurong City treasurer and a female staffer in a highway robbery in Buluan last year, and the killing of a certain M/Sgt. Tupas of the 38th Infantry Battalion also in Buluan in 1998.
Del Prado said the 6th ID and all of its component brigades are still tracking down two other henchmen of Alonto, Mayangkang Saguile and Samad Pandita, who will likely take over the Pentagon leadership.
Alonto, along with 17 of his followers, was believed killed in an airstrike on his lair in S.K. Pendatun, Maguindanao last Aug. 13.
"We are directed to cleanse Central Mindanao of wanted persons, especially the kidnappers. We started it when we got Kapuyak’s boss, Tahir Alonto," said Col. Jerry Jalandoni, chief of the 404th IB based in Tacurong City.
"Huwag mag-alala yung mga kasamahan ni Alonto at Kapuyak dahil isusunod na namin sila (The henchmen of Alonto and Kapuyak need not worry because we will go after them next)," he added. — With Ramil Bajo