CAMP SIONGCO, Maguindanao , Philippines – The Army’s 6th Infantry Division has fielded more soldiers in the surroundings of Datu Piang, Maguindanao due to mounting threats of renewed attacks by a rogue Moro faction that bombarded and shelled with mortars a village there and nearby areas in Pikit, North Cotabato.
A three-year-old Muslim child was killed while six others were injured in the bombardment.
The spokesman of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, Von Al-Haq, was quick to disown the leader of the marauding gunmen, Commander Tatah Uy, a defeated mayoral candidate in Datu Piang during the May 10 elections.
Al-Haq said Uy, who lost to uncle, re-elected Datu Piang Mayor Samer Uy, has been delisted from the MILF’s roster of guerillas when he filed his candidacy for mayor.
Uy, who is of mixed Chinese and Maguindanaon descent, is known for his links with radical Islamists abroad.
The 6th ID immediately started bracing for a calibrated offensive against Uy and his followers after Al-Haq confirmed that Uy is no longer a member of the MILF.
“Now we can perform our security functions against this person without being charged of violating the ceasefire,” said Lt. Col. Benjamin Hao, 6th ID spokesman.
Uy and his followers fired several rounds of 81 MM mortar at populated areas at the border of Pikit and Datu Piang towns the other day, hitting an evacuation site housing ethnic Maguindanaons displaced by military-MILF hostilities in previous years.
The police identified the slain child as Mohammad Abdul, who died from shrapnel wounds when one of the mortar projectiles Uy’s group fired landed near him.
The wounded villagers, siblings Amiyah, nine and Laga-Laga Kasim, four; Tauten Pamaloy, 33; Fatimah Buka, 29; Muslimin Sali, 14 and Tawkan Abdul, 32, were rushed to a nearby hospital for medication.