Suspected rebs torch poultry farm

CAMP MAKABULOS, Tarlac - Over 2,000 chickens were roasted live, and more than P2.5 million worth of property was destroyed after suspected communist guerrillas set a poultry farm on fire in Sta. Ignacia town last Monday night.

According to reports reaching the provincial police, 20 heavily armed men swooped down on the Bondoc Poultry Farm in Barangay Sta. Ines in Sta. Ignacia at about 8 p.m.

After ordering all the farm workers of businessman Cecilio Bondoc to vacate the area, the armed men doused six poultry houses, the workers' sleeping quarters, a generator machine, two service vehicles, a delivery truck and an XLT van with gasoline and set them afire.

The raid reportedly stemmed from Bondoc's repeated refusal to pay "revolutionary taxes" to communist rebels.

Last year, the same poultry farm was also raided by New People's Army (NPA) rebels operating in Tarlac's western towns.

Elements of the Army's 69th Infantry Battalion are currently conducting pursuit operations against the poultry farm's raiders who are believed to have gone back to their mountain lair in Gov. Jose Yap's upland hometown of San Jose.

Poultry farm owners in Sta. Ignacia and Camiling towns have long been complaining about the communists' "progressive revolutionary taxation scheme."

Lt. Col. Remegio de Vera, commander of the Army's 69th IB, said the rebels collect as much as P3 million a month in revolutionary taxes, the bulk of which comes from poultry and piggery farms located in the rebels' so-called "guerrilla zones" in the province.-