Suspected MILF men ambush re-electionist councilor

COTABATO City, Philippines - Suspected Moro rebels ambushed and wounded three persons, including a re-electionist councilor in a daring attack Sunday in a remote barangay in North Cotabato’s politically hostile Banisilan town.

The victims, Bobby Rajahmuda, who is seeking a second term in the Banisilan municipal council, and his companion, Sgt. Vernie Hollero, of the Army’s 40th Infantry Battalion, were on their way to Barangay Busaun in the same town on board a pickup truck when gunmen emerged from one side of the road and shot them with M-16 and M-14 assault rifles.

Rajahmuda’s driver, Bobby Delfin, was also wounded in the attack.

The councilor is running under the ticket of the United Nationalist Alliance (UNA).

Senior Inspector Ritchelle Alocilja, chief of the Banisilan police, said the victims were on their way home from a campaign sortie of the local UNA chapter when they were ambushed at an uphill curve in a secluded stretch of a farm-to-market road connecting the municipal center to Barangay Busaon.

Alocilja said investigators are now verifying allegations by witnesses that a certain Commander Tandah Tidong of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and more than a dozen of his followers were behind the ambush.

Sources from the Banisilan municipal peace and order council said Tindong and his men retreated to a nearby hinterland after sensing the arrival of responding policemen and soldiers.

The victims were rushed to a hospital in Midsayap town for treatment.

Rajahmuda said his family and the group of Tidong are locked in rido (clan war), which has been persisting for more than a decade now.

He declined to reveal what triggered the rido between his clan and Tidong’s group.