Thursday, January 19, 2006
Firms paying rebels in Northern Mindanao: Army
By Danilo V. Adorador III
CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY -- Several corporations in Northern Mindanao are serving as the financial backbone of communist rebels in the region, a military official said.
The claim comes at a time of heightened guerilla operations of the New Peoples Army's (NPA) Special Partisan Unit in Northern Mindanao Region (Sparu). Rebel assaults had so far claimed the lives of several law enforcers and a barangay captain this month.
Military officials said the rebels are targeting more public officials, a claim denied by the North Central Mindanao party committee spokesperson Cesar Renerio.
More rebel attacks could be expected in the region, as the NPA's March anniversary celebration is drawing nearer, said Colonel Andrelino Molina, commanding officer of the Philippine Army's 8th Infantry Brigade based in the Misamis Oriental town of Claveria.
After admitting that its urban guerilla unit was behind the deaths of a policeman in Gingoog City and a barangay captain in Talisayan town, two suspected NPA rebels gunned down over the weekend a police officer and a Civilian Volunteer Organization member in the Bukidnon municipality of Don Carlos.
The latest killings came a week after military and police authorities nabbed two suspected Sparu members in Balingasag town, about 50 kilometers east of Cagayan de Oro City.
Police identified the suspected rebels as Emmanuel Olinas Saguinlao, 24, alias "Ka Ribrib," and 22-year-old Junie Almonte Mandamiñeo, both residents of Medina, a town where, according to the military, NPA sightings are common.
Charges of illegal possession of firearms have yet to be filed against the two.
On Tuesday, two squads from the 8th IB figured in a brief encounter with an unspecified number of rebels in Salay town, about 70 kilometers east of Cagayan de Oro.
Two soldiers were slightly injured, Colina said, but it was not known if the fleeing rebels sustained casualties.
Extortion
While the NPA's strength--estimated by the military to be only about 40 fulltime guerillas--continued to decrease in recent years, Colina said, the Front 4B operating in the hinterland areas of Misamis Oriental are "very active in recovering back areas previously under its influence."
"But we are ready in defending the areas we have wrested from them, not only by force but by different development initiatives with the help of the Misamis Oriental government," he said.
Colina identified Misamis Oriental's eastern towns of Lagonglong, Salay, and Balingasag as areas where rebels are said to be maintaining minor bases.
The rebels, he said, are using other eastern towns and the province's component city of Gingoog as alternate routes.
Misamis Oriental Governor Oscar Moreno has earlier vowed to prioritize the province's underdeveloped areas "to address the root causes" of communist insurgency.
One of the problems that the military sees in stamping out the insurgency problem in the region, Colina said, is the financial support funneled by "big businesses" in the region to the rebel "through revolutionary taxes."
"But we can't blame these companies because the NPA would threaten to harm their businesses if they refuse to comply with the demands," he said.
"Revolutionary taxes, in truth, is simply extortion in another name," added Colina.
He said the names of different businesses giving revolutionary taxes to the NPA have been submitted to the police hierarchy in the region.
The NPA's legal fronts are also "being addressed," he said, claiming that these organizations have become the recruitment base of the rebel movement. (Sun.Star Cagayan de Oro/Sunnex)
(January 19, 2006 issue)
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