Man with grenade nabbed in Kidapawan

KIDAPAWAN CITY, Philippines - Kidapawan City Mayor Joseph Evangelista on Tuesday lauded the local police for preventing on Sunday what could have possibly been the seventh grenade attack in Central Mindanao in two weeks.

Policemen intercepted the 35-year-old Mark Garde Villamor carrying a fragmentation grenade while driving his motorcycle en route to the city proper from an outskirt west of the city.

Superintendent John Calinga, director of the Kidapawan City police, said the suspect, now detained, had been charged with illegal possession of explosive before a local court.

The mayor said he is grateful to the city police for having arrested Villamor before he could set off the grenade policemen found in his bag when his motorcycle was flagged down for inspection at a security roadblock.

Calinga said probers are still trying to determine the possible link between Villamor and those behind last week’s three successive grenade attacks in nearby Kabacan town in North Cotabato, which injured five people all, one of them a four-year-old child.

Kidapawan City, North Cotabato’s provincial capital, is less than 20 kilometers from the town proper of Kabacan.

“These are the kinds of accomplishments that can make our people feel that we have a very functional police force in Kidapawan City,” Evangelista said in a statement.

The arrest of Villamor was preceded by a spate of grenade explosions, in a span of just seven days, in Cotabato City and in Isulan town, capital of Sultan Kudarat province.

At least 13 people, among them four children and two members of the Army’s 5th Special Forces Battalion, were injured in the Cotabato City and Isulan bombings.

Calinga said credit for the arrest of Villamor has to go to the office of the city mayor for actively supporting the anti-crime and pacification efforts of the local police force.