Dy's to Padaca: Don’t divert issues

CAUAYAN CITY– Members of Isabela’s still politically influential Dy family called on their political rivals led by Gov. Grace Padaca not to divert issues on last Thursday’s killing of a councilor in Alicia town by attributing political motives behind it.

Alicia Mayor Napoleon Dy said blaming the killing of councilor Primo Dasig, a political ally of both Padaca and Vice Gov. Ramon Reyes, on politics beclouds the issues and in a away hampers the investigation into the incident. 

“They all have a right to question the killing, attributing to it all kinds of motives, but I think it would be much better if we leave the investigation to the police, and wait for whatever they have to say about the incident before making all kinds of insinuations,” he said. 

Dasig, 59, died while undergoing treatment for bullet wounds at the Cagayan Valley Medical Center after two motorcycle-riding men fired at him in front of a grocery store at the Alicia public market at around 6:30 p.m. last Thursday.

Senior Superintendent Dominador Aquino, Isabela police director, said Dasig was alighting from his owner-type jeep when the two ski mask-wearing men shot him at least thrice.

He said responding policemen found at least four empty caliber .45 shells at the crime scene.  

Aquino said they are considering all possible angles in the killing of Dasig, also the auditor of the provincial chapter of Philippine Councilors’ League and a nephew of veteran dzRH-Cagayan Valley reporter Joe Dasig Jr.  

Dy, who was on leave, accused both Padaca and Reyes of putting political color to the incident by allegedly playing up the fact that Dasig was not his partymate. 

Earlier, Reyes, who served as a long-time Alicia mayor and three-term congressman, said that obviously politics could be the main reason behind the gunslaying of Dasig, whom he described as having “no known personal enemies,” except those with political motives.  

“I condemn this killing to a high degree for he (Dasig) was not only an ordinary citizen but a councilor of a town. If they can do that to him, how much more to an ordinary citizen?” said Reyes, who also described Dasig as a “fiscalizer” in the Alicia municipal council. 

Lately, Reyes said Dasig had questioned the municipal government for its purchase of a P1.2-million amphibious vehicle as well as the construction of a new three-story municipal building.

Padaca, in an earlier text message to The STAR, said, “I do not even have to comment. Just go to Alicia town. Listen to what the people there think. Better still listen to what they cannot say. Feel their terrified silence.” `

Dy’s younger brother, Rep. Faustino Dy III, said the attempts of Padaca, Reyes and their allies to indirectly implicate the Alicia municipal government in Dasig’s killing was a way of diverting issues on the apparent neglect of the provincial leadership on the delivery of basic social services.