2 dead, 5 hurt in MILF ambush

COTABATO CITY – Moro guerrillas ambushed a passenger jeep in Pikit, North Cotabato yesterday morning, killing two, including an eight-year-old girl, and seriously wounding five others, among them three minors.

Police identified the fatalities as Osang Ungkay, 20, and eight-year-old Aida Musa, who both died from multiple gunshot wounds.

Investigators said the victims, along with their relatives, were on their way from nearby Aleosan town to an interior village in Barangay Langayen, Pikit town on board a multi-cab when they were waylaid.

Those wounded – Fahad Ungkay, 16; Umbra Musa, 10; Emram Musa, 15; Mamaila Noh, 18; and Longlong Zainal, 19 – were rushed to the Cotabato Regional Medical Center here.

Lt. Col. Julieto Ando, spokesman of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, said there were reports from their intelligence units in Pikit and surrounding towns that followers of renegade Ameril Ombra Kato, chief of the 105th Base Command of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, were responsible for the ambush.

“But we are still trying to investigate that,” Ando said.

Kato, who carries a P10-million bounty, is wanted for leading bloody attacks in North Cotabato and Maguindanao after the aborted signing of the memorandum of agreement on ancestral domain (MOA-AD) last Aug. 5.

The document was to be the basis for the setting up of a Muslim homeland in the South, to be governed by the MILF through the proposed Bangsamoro Juridical Entity.

Police have launched a manhunt for the rebels behind the ambush in Barangay Langayen, a known stronghold of the MILF.

Pikit officials said they were also investigating if rido or clan war motivated the incident.

In another development, the military has given clearance to thousands of internally displaced persons (IDPs) housed in evacuation centers in a number of Lanao del Norte towns to return to their communities.

Col. Agane Adriatico, spokesman of the Army’s 1st Infantry Division, said the province is now peaceful, two months after the attacks by the group of MILF leader Abdurahman Macapaar alias Commander Bravo.

The attacks in the towns of Kolambugan and Kauswagan left scores of people dead and wounded, properties destroyed and forced thousands of residents to flee their homes.

From the total 32,000 evacuees attended to by government agencies, the number has been reduced to 5,000 who remain in evacuation centers in the towns of Munai, Tangkal, Poona Piagapo, and Kolambugan, the Office of Civil Defense in Region 10 said. – With Lino de la Cruz and James Mananghaya