COTABATO CITY, Philippines – Soldiers promptly foiled on Thursday night an attempt to set off a roadside bomb along a secluded stretch of a highway traversing Maguindanao’s Datu Saudi town.
Col. Prudencio Asto, public affairs chief of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, said the roadside bomb, fashioned from two live 60-mm mortar projectiles rigged with an improvised blasting mechanism attached to a mobile phone, was defused by bomb disposal experts before it could explode.
“It was so fortunate that vigilant passersby found the improvised explosive and reported its presence along a stretch of the highway in Barangay Kambingi in Datu Saudi,” Asto said.
The bomb was spotted about three hours after a convoy of more than 10 vehicles led by acting Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao Gov. Mujiv Hataman, passed through the same route from Buluan town.
Hataman’s group, including the regional police director, Chief Superintendent Mario Avenido, was on its way to Cotabato City from three separate project launchings in Buluan and Datu Paglas towns in Maguindanao.
Last Thursday morning, an improvised bomb exploded near a branch of the Land Bank of the Philippines in Tacurong City, about 40 kilometers southeast of Datu Saudi.
Two weeks ago, police and military intelligence reports showed that members of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters led by renegade rebel leader Ameril Umbra Kato were out to launch bombings in Maguindanao where Army forces were pursuing them.