Samar police chief axed over NPA raid

PALO, LEYTE - Regional police officials dismissed the police chief of Catbalogan, Samar and placed the Samar police director under investigation after 15 heavily armed communist guerrillas raided and burned a relay station of Smart Communications last Thursday.

Chief Inspector Oscar Cadiz, Catbalogan police chief, was not able to prevent the attack despite an earlier intelligence report that the New People's Army (NPA) would raid an installation in the town.

Superintendent Danilo Flordeliza, Samar police director, was placed under investigation by Eastern Visayas police director Domingo Reyes Jr. for "command responsibility" and for failing to report the incident.

The 70-member Catbalogan police force also faces an investigation.

Police said the NPA guerrillas burned the relay station and destroyed expensive communications equipment after overpowering a lone security guard. They also took a company-owned cellular phone.

The relay tower is on a hillside three kilometers away from the provincial police headquarters and the Army's 8th Infantry Division base at Camp Vicente Lukban in Barangay Maulong.

"It is a vital installation that requires security and police visibility," Reyes told The STAR. "We will make everybody explain here."

Police and Army troops are hunting down the raiders and arson investigators are determining the extent of damage.

It is the second time that a facility of Smart Communications in the region has been attacked. Last Nov. 12, suspected NPA guerrillas destroyed a parabolic satellite antenna of the company in Barangay San Pablo in Ormoc City.

Ormoc police investigators said the facility was attacked because the Smart management refused to pay "revolutionary taxes" to the communists.

"It's confirmed," Chief Inspector Carlos Lozano, regional intelligence officer, said. "We have received that information in November last year."

The STAR learned from military and police intelligence reports that the NPA was targeting the relay towers of Smart Communications in Region 8.

Other NPA targets are the headquarters of the regional police and regional mobile group, the Leyte geothermal power plant, depots of Petron in Tacloban City and Jiabong, Samar, and the towers of a TV station.

"There was already an advance warning to them," said Lozano. "We have sent messages to them."

Meanwhile, at Camps Aguinaldo and Crame, military and police commanders were ordered to resume operations against the communists after the holiday ceasefire declared by President Estrada last Dec. 10 expired last night. - With Jaime Laude