Army troops thwart BIFF plan to torch heavy equipment

NORTH COTABATO, Philippines - Army troops thwarted the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters' (BIFF) plan to torch road construction equipment in Midsayap town late Wednesday.

Although outnumbered, combatants of the Army’s 40th Infantry Battalion at a roadside detachment in Barangay Ulandang, Midsayap managed to drive the bandits away by crawling to their right and left flanks and engaged them in a 20-minute firefight.

The military said that five of the bandits were wounded in the encounter.

While the BIFF bandits were trading shots with soldiers manning the detachment, another group tried to approach the equipment owned by a private firm constructing farm-to-market roads in the area.

Soldiers prevented the bandits from getting close to the equipment by firing shoulder-fire 40MM grenades, forcing them to scamper away.

Barangay officials said the bandits that attempted to get close to the road-building machinery left plastic containers filled with gasoline and torches made of dried coconut palms as they fled in haste.

Col. Dickson Hermoso, public affairs chief of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division based in Datu Odin Sinsuat town in Maguindanao, said military units in Central Mindanao are on full alert due to threats of retaliations from the BIFF.

The BIFF suffered heavy losses in last week’s spate of encounters with the military in Pikit, North Cotabato and at the boundary of Maguindanao’s adjoining Saidona and Datu Piang towns.