Powerful homemade bomb found in N. Cotabato bridge

COTABATO CITY - Lawmen yesterday found a powerful homemade explosive rigged by suspected Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) rebels on a bridge in Kabacan, North Cotabato, in what could have been the second attempt to explode a bomb in the town in a week.

Senior Superintendent Alex Paul Monteagudo, North Cotabato police director, said they had to close to traffic the portion of the Cotabato-Davao Highway in Katidtuan, Kabacan, where the bridge is located, for several hours.

"It is very obvious that this is another attempt to terrorize the province," Monteagudo said.

The bomb, made of incendiary substances placed inside a plastic container and equipped with an improvised blasting contraption, was tied to the railing of the bridge, just adjacent to a telephone terminal.

While the size of the bomb might not be enough to totally destroy the bridge, Monteagudo said he was certain it could destroy the communication lines dangling from a post nearby.

"Initially, we can surmise that the bomb was rigged at the bridge to destroy communication lines," he said.

Capt. Noel Detoyato, spokesman of the Army's 6th Infantry Division, said the bombing attempt could have been pulled off to divert the attention of military units securing entry and exit points of known MILF camps all over Central Mindanao.

"These are desperate moves which (indicate) that they (MILF rebels) are bent on doing anything, to the extent of harming civilians, just to create diversions," Detoyato said.

A powerful explosion rocked Kabacan's town proper at dawn last Wednesday. The military blamed the MILF for the bomb attack which partly destroyed an appliance store.

Meanwhile, state and MILF forces pounded each other's positions in Marugong, Lanao del Sur for the fourth day yesterday as the military sought to re-install local officials who abandoned their posts after the rebels took over the town last week.

At least three soldiers and 23 rebels have been killed in running gunbattles, according to Maj. Johnny Macanas, spokesman of the Army's 4th Infantry Division.

The offensive on known MILF positions in Marugong was in response to clamors by the beleaguered town officials to drive away the rebels.

Macanas said the rebels controlling Marugong town are led by the vice mayor himself, a certain Malapandi Kusain.