NPAs burn heavy equipment in Agusan

BUTUAN CITY, Philippines  – Suspected New People’s Army (NPA) rebels burned heavy equipment including a backhoe loader at Madyaw Construction Development Corp. in Purok Sarabia, Barangay Tagcatong, Carmen, Agusan del Norte before midnight of Thursday, a police report said yesterday.

The heavy equipment was parked at the provincial road, where a government construction project is underway, when at least four armed NPA rebels torched it.

A report from the Caraga police regional information office said the NPAs burned the equipment after the construction firm allegedly failed to pay revolutionary tax.

Caraga police regional director Chief Superintendent Reynaldo Rafal earlier said NPA rebels in the Caraga region had collected millions of pesos in revolutionary taxes from mining, construction, logging and other business establishments operating in the region.