Rebels kill Lakas-NUCD mayoral bet in Albay

LEGAZPI CITY, Albay — The Bicol command of the New People’s Army (NPA) owned up yesterday to the killing of a Lakas-NUCD mayoral candidate in Camalig town Friday night, accusing him of receiving money to put up a cement factory in the town.

The NPA’s Santos-Binamira Command, in a statement signed by its spokesman, Florante Orobia, accused the victim, Dr. Florencio Muñoz, of conniving with some government officials to allow the Taiwanese-owned Goodfound Cement Corp. to put up a plant in Camalig.

The cement plant is now the subject of complaints from residents in its vicinity.

The NPA also alleged that Muñoz had enlisted militiamen for the cement firm’s operations.

Muñoz was the third candidate killed in the Bicol region in less than two weeks.

Muñoz was shot five times — twice in the head and thrice in different parts of the body — shortly after delivering a campaign speech at about 9:30 p.m. in Barangay Bariw , an upland village some seven kilometers from the Camalig town proper.

Muñoz served as Camalig mayor for three consecutive terms until he retired in 1998. He was aiming for a comeback in this year’s elections, to succeed his wife, Paz, the incumbent mayor.

He died while being rushed to the Bicol Regional Training and Teaching Hospital here.

Quoting witnesses, Superintendent Reynaldo Rafal, Albay police director, said at least three young-looking men shot Muñoz at close range with caliber .45 handguns.

Muñoz’s wife and Legazpi City Mayor Imelda Roces, who is running for Congress in the province’s second district, were with him when the shooting took place.

The NPA’s admission confirmed Rafal’s earlier suspicion that communist rebels were behind Muñoz’s assassination, as he noted the firearms used and the description of the gunmen.

Rafal also cited police intelligence reports that the NPA had tagged Muñoz a persona non grata for allowing the Goodfound cement factory during his term as Camalig mayor.

Zacarias Zaragoza, regional director of the Commission on Elections, said he will meet with concerned authorities, particularly the military, to discuss the possibility of placing Albay and other provinces in Bicol under Comelec control.

Earlier, assassins’ bullets felled Jose Bulalacao, who was aspiring for a provincial board seat in Camarines Norte; and comebacking former mayor Felix Frayna of Sta. Magdalena, Sorsogon.

Communist rebels were also believed behind the killing of Bulalacao, 52, a former provincial jail warden and deputy police chief of Jose Panganiban town, who was gunned down shortly after a campaign sortie.

Meanwhile, Frayna, a Lakas-NUCD candidate, was riddled with bullets while speaking onstage at the poblacion of Sta. Magdalena town. — With Celso Amo