MARAWI CITY, Philippines - Suspected partisans on Thursday night blasted a fragmentation grenade at the residential compound here of the reelectionist Vice Mayor Arafat Salic.
His relatives blamed rival camps for the attack, which was for them meant to spark violence for the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to have reason to put the entire Marawi City under its full control on May 9.
Responding investigators from the Marawi City police said the explosion inside the home yard of Salic damaged vehicles parked near the spot where the grenade landed and went off.
Salic is the running mate of former Marawi City Mayor Solitario Ali, a senior official of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), now candidate for the same post.
The 62-year-old Ali had earlier lost two close relatives, Amelodin and Tengteng, also both Maranaws, in separate gun attacks in the past three weeks which the police said were politically-motivated.
The blast that shook the surroundings of Salic’s house was one of two explosions that rocked Marawi City Thursday night, according to Col. Roseller Murillo, commander of the Army’s 103rd Brigade.
Marawi City, which has 96 barangays, is the capital of Lanao del Sur, a component province of ARMM.
A provincial police official, Senior Superintendent Rustom Duran, had told reporters investigators are yet to determine the identities of the suspects in the grenade attacks late Thursday, first at the house of Salic in Barangay Lilod Madaya, and subsequently, near the infirmary of the Mindanao State University (MSU) at Barangay Lomidong.
Investigators said the bombing of the house of Salic was perpetrated by masked men riding a Toyota Avanza. They sped away just as the grenade exploded, damaging the vice mayor’s Toyota pick-up truck and two other vehicles parked nearby.
Witnesses had told probers the bombing at the MSU campus was pulled off by men riding motorcycles and a Toyota Revo.
Bai Nadjema, spokesperson of the mayoral aspirant Ali, and his younger brother, Marawi City Mayor Fahad Salic, candidate for Lanao del Sur governor, said their followers have just been ignoring the incidents which they believe were instigated for them to retaliate on rival quarters.
“That is something we will not do because we want the May 9 elections here in Marawi City to be peaceful and orderly,” Bai Nadjema said.
The Lanao del Sur police and the Army’s 103rd Brigade on Friday deployed more uniformed men in strategic areas in Marawi City to help prevent any escalation of election-related violence in the area.