NORTH COTABATO, Philippines — Officials on Saturday offered a total of P200,000 in cash incentives for information that would lead to the arrest of culprits in Wednesday's deadly market bombing in Mlang municipality.
Two residents were killed while 33 others were injured in the bombing.
Mlang Mayor Joselito Piñol, presiding chair of the municipal peace and order council, and North Cotabato Gov. Emmylou Taliño-Mendoza each shelled out P100,000 for the bounty.
"We now have P200,000 cash ready to be paid to anyone who could help the police locate the whereabouts of the bombers," Piñol said.
Piñol and Mendoza are optimistic that their offer of reward money will hasten the arrest of the culprits.
Piñol has blamed the brigand Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) as responsible for Wednesday's bombing, the second in Mlang in just five weeks.
Two villagers were killed while more than 20 others were injured when unidentified bombers set off an improvised explosive device near a billiard hall in the town proper of Mlang last November 23.
Senior Supt. Danny Peralta, director of the North Cotabato police, said the latest bombing in Mlang could have been pulled off by cohorts of Adziz Glang, a resident of the same town, who was arrested by policemen earlier in connection with his alleged involvement in the November bombing.
Adziz is a suspected member of the BIFF, which is said to have links with the notorious Al-Khobar extortion syndicate.