NPAs torch 3 Bulacan rock-crushing plants

Communist guerrillas struck again, this time burning three rock-crushing plants during a dawn raid in Angat, Bulacan yesterday,

Last Tuesday, the New People’s Army (NPA) swooped down on the police station of Maco, Compostela Valley, carting away several firearms and ammunition.

The Maco raiders were accompanied by the town’s mayor, Miller Alaba, whom they had taken hostage. Authorities are now investigating Alaba and the policemen who were on duty during the attack.

Four days earlier, the rebels burned the generator and air-conditioning system of cellular phone firm Globe Telecom in Barangay Coronon, Sta. Cruz, Davao del Sur.

The rebel offensives have prompted Philippine National Police chief Director General Hermogenes Ebdane Jr. to place all police units nationwide under heightened alert to thwart more attacks.

Reports reaching Camp Crame said about 20 to 25 insurgents swooped down on Barangays Donacion and Niugan in Angat town, and then torched the three rock-crushing plants, one of them said to be owned by Angat Mayor Leonardo de Leon.

The rebels also destroyed three backhoes, each worth about P1.5 million, at the crushing plants on the banks of the Angat River. The plants were major sources of gravel and sand and stone bricks of building and road contractors in Central Luzon and Metro Manila.

In Southern Mindanao, Chief Superintendent Isidro Lapeña, regional police director, said security has been tightened in vital installations following the Maco raid.

"We have always been on red alert. In fact, we have alert teams even before the recent incidents but this time, we have tightened security anew and reminded our policemen of the importance of being alert," he said. — With Edith Regalado