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Friday, June 27, 2008
Transco tower in North Cotabato bombed
By Malu Cadelina Manar
Correspondent
KIDAPAWAN CITY -- Suspected Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) rebels bombed another power facility in Barangay Bagontapay in M'lang, North Cotabato at 9:45 p.m. Wednesday.
The incident is the third attack against the National Transmission Corp. (Transco) in Central Mindanao since Monday.
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M'lang Mayor Joselito Pinol said three improvised explosive device (IED) fashioned from 81-mm mortars were planted near Transco's steel tower in Barangay Bagontapay, around 200 meters away from M'lang-Matalam highway.
Pinol said the explosion was so powerful that it destroyed two of the four steel posts of the tower.
The felled tower connects power from lligan City to the 138-kilovolt line in Tacurong City, said Felix Canja, institutional and development services manager of the Cotabato Electric Cooperative (Cotelco).
Cotelco is one of the electric firms in Central Mindanao that buys power from Transco.
Hours after the explosion, the armed group also fired two rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) at the sub-station of Cotelco in Barangay Manubuan in nearby Matalam town.
Canja said no one was injured in the attack, but the anti-tank rockets damaged the cemented walls that surrounded Cotelco's biggest transformer in Manubuan village.
Wednesday's attack on the Transco facility was the third since June 23.
Suspected MILF rebels fired anti-tank rockets on two Transco facilities in barangays Santa Maria and Limulan in Kalamansig, a coastal town in Sultan Kudarat, on the night of June 23.
The said attack resulted to power blackouts in Kalamansig and nearby coastal Lebak town.
Authorities meanwhile are not discounting possibilities the attacks could have been perpetrated by the Al Khobar Terror Group, an extortion group operating in Central Mindanao.
"The Al Khobar could have done it, though, other information reaching us say that the Moro rebel group was behind it," said Cotabato provincial director Lester Camba.
In July 2007, the Al Khobar admitted it was their group that bombed a Transco tower in Barangay Nuangan here. The group was extorting protection money from the Kidapawan City Government, Camba said. (Sun.Star Davao/Sunnex)
For more Philippine news, visit Sun.Star Davao. (June 27, 2008 issue)
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