NPA rebels ransack Misamis police station's armory

ZAMBOANGA CITY - Heavily armed members of the New People’s Army (NPA) raided the police station in Don Victoriano Chiongbian town, Misamis Occidental before dawn Saturday.

Capt. Jefferson Somera, public affairs chief of the Philippine Army's 1st Division, said 30 rebels wearing military uniforms barged into the police station at around 5 a.m.

“The rebels disarmed the policemen on duty and ransacked the station’s armory,” Somera said.

The rebels were able to cart away from the police station one caliber 60 machinegun, one M203 grenade launcher, seven armalite rifles, nine short firearms and numbers ammunitions of different caliber and withdrew towards the hinterland of Josefina town.

Lt. Col. Rommel Almaria, chief of the 55th Infantry Battalion, said troops dispatched to aid the policemen encountered the rebels who set up a blocking team near the police station.

Almaria said that the rebels were supposed to attack another police station in Josefina town, but they were foiled by the responding troops.

The military official believes that the attack was in retaliation to the death of their notorious leader Henry Celajes alias Jongjong, the deputy secretary of the Western Mindanao Revolutionary Party Committee (WMRPC).

Celajes was killed during an encounter in Barangay Gala, Tudela, Misamis Occidental last September.