Another V-Day suspect arrested

Another suspect in the Valentine’s Day bombings that killed 13 people in three cities fell into government hands over the weekend.

Rahib Buday, a native of Maguindanao, is also being implicated in the bombing of a movie house at SM Megamall in Mandaluyong City in May 2000.

Reports reaching Camp Aguinaldo showed Buday, who has a standing warrant of arrest, was apprehended in his home in Layog, Pagalungan town at around 11 p.m. Saturday.

The 49-year-old suspect reportedly did not resist arrest unlike his alleged cohort Gappal Bana, alias Boy Negro, who initially evaded authorities pursuing him in Camarines Sur before he was collared last Thursday.

Buday’s arrest was effected by a joint team of Military Intelligence Group 12 members and intelligence operatives of the 40th Infantry Battalion of the Philippine Army who are currently interrogating him.

He is the fourth suspect arrested for the Feb. 14 bombing spree.

Buday is suspected of involvement in the bombing of a passenger bus in the financial district of Makati City that left six dead and over a hundred others injured. Two other bombs that exploded in the southern cities of General Santos and Davao on the same day also left several dead.

The Abu Sayyaf has claimed responsibility for the attacks purportedly launched in retaliation for the government offensive against Muslim rebels in Sulu.

The bombing in the May 2000 attack happened inside a comfort room in one of the cinemas in SM Megamall in Mandaluyong City. One man was killed and several others were wounded.

Explosive experts claimed the bomb was assembled inside the comfort room and placed inside a plastic cup.

It was not clear what was Buday’s role in this attack.

Apart from Bana, also arrested earlier for the Feb. 14 bombings was Angelo Trinidad alias Abu Khalil. Bana, 24, identified as the supplier of explosives used in the bombings, the military said.

Bana yielded to Camarines Sur Rep. Rolando Andaya Jr. in Libmanan town after much prodding from his wife as military forces closed in on him.

According to the military report, Bana, who speaks several dialects, was recruited in 2003 by Abu Sayyaf commander Abu Solaiman for terrorist training.

For three months starting in June last year, he underwent training in "practical, re-encounter and explosives" in a mountainous area of Marawi City, with a certain Jacky as instructor.

Authorities said Bana’s first order from Khalil last November was to take custody of their firearms and explosive components to be used in the Valentine’s Day attack in Makati City.

Bana stored these in a safehouse in Maharlika Village in Taguig.

Three months later, Khalil and Bana met at a gas station also in Taguig regarding the plot.

The explosives and firearms in Bana’s custody included eight kilos of Trinitrotoluene (TNT), black powder, two caliber .45 automatics, 10 pieces of detonators and assorted explosive materials.

Meanwhile, the military said another alleged Abu Sayyaf member, Rasidin Mohammad, was captured by troops in the southern city of Zamboanga Friday.

Mohammad allegedly took part in the kidnapping of a group of Filipino tourists and three Americans from a resort in Palawan in 2001. Two of the Americans died in captivity.

Buday and Mohammad will undergo "tactical interrogation" before being turned over to police for proper filing of charges, the military said.

The Abu Sayyaf, founded in the early 1990s by Afghan-trained Islamic scholar Abdurajak Janjalani, is a small but brutal group of militants that analysts say is fast becoming a major threat in the region.

Last year, it was blamed for the firebombing of a passenger ferry in Manila Bay, killing over 100 in the Philippines’ worst militant attack.