Isabela’s Dy says he’s on NPA liquidation list

ILAGAN, Isabela — Gov. Faustino Dy admitted yesterday that he is on the liquidation list of the New People’s Army (NPA) for pushing a multimillion-peso cassava plantation and a flour mill here.

Dy said elements of the Intelligence Service of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (ISAFP) have confirmed the information.

Members of the National Peace and Order Council, he said, discussed the information during their recent meeting after the ISAFP furnished them a list of local officials whom the NPA is targeting for liquidation.

Before ISAFP’s disclosure, Dy said he had received information from local sources that he was, indeed, on the NPA hit list.

"They are now going against me. The threat came after I ignored their demand for me to stop pushing the establishment of a cassava plantation and flour mill in the province," he said.

However, Brig. Gen. Rodolfo Alvarado, commanding general of the Army’s 5th Infantry Division based in Gamu town, could not confirm the ISAFP’s report.

"I am not aware of such an information. I have to consult our own intelligence sources here," he said.

Dy said the project intends to convert at least 1,000 hectares of idle land in the Mallig region into a cassava plantation. It also includes the setting up of a multimillion-peso flour mill to be financed by the San Miguel Corp.

The provincial government, Dy said, has signed a memorandum of agreement with San Miguel Corp. for the cassava plantation and flour mill, through the Valley Planters Development Cooperative.

He said the project is expected to create hundreds of jobs for farmers whose main source of livelihood at present is limited to small-scale rice and corn farming.

He said at least 3,000 families in the vast Mallig region stand to benefit from this project. The region covers the northern towns of Aurora, Quezon, Quirino, Burgos, Mallig, Gamu and Delfin Albano.

Some communities in these towns, Dy said, remain to be a major source of mass-based support for the NPA in Cagayan Valley.

He said the communist rebels will be deprived of their mass base here if the project pushes through.

But Victor Servidores, leader of the NPA’s Fortunato Camus Command-Isabela Front Committee, claimed that the project would instead displace hundreds of impoverished farmers in the Mallig region.

The Fortunato Camus Command claimed responsibility for the assassination of former Cagayan Rep. Rodolfo Aguinaldo last June 12.

Earlier, Dy warned local officials, especially leaders of remote "rebel-influenced" villages, that giving shelter to or coddling rebels is tantamount to fomenting rebellion.