Wanted CTG leader dead in Sultan Kudarat clash

COTABATO CITY — Local executives in Sultan Kudarat province on Friday urged the remaining members of the New People’s Army to surrender following Tuesday’s death of a regional guerilla leader in a brief clash with soldiers in Kalamansig town.

Brig. Gen Michael Santos, commander of the Army’s 603rd Infantry Brigade, Major Gen. Alex Rillera of the 6th Infantry Division and members of the municipal peace and order council in Kalamansig, Sultan Kudarat separately confirmed to reporters on Friday the demise of Ray Masot Zambrano in the incident.

Zambrano, wanted for more than a dozen criminal cases in different courts in Region 12, was top leader of the self-styled Timlas Platoon of the Far South Mindanao Region Command of the New People’s Army, now most known as “communist terrorist group,” or CTG, in police and military parlance.

Zambrano and his companions opened fire first on personnel of the 37th Infantry Battalion dispatched to verify their reported presence in a secluded area in Barangay Obial in Kalamansig, sparking a gunfight that resulted in his death.

“It was the residents of Kalamansig long complaining about their abuses who reported to the 37th IB their presence in the area," Santos said.

Companions of Zambrano left his cadaver, his firearms — an AK-47 rifle and a .45 caliber pistol — and other belongings as they scampered away when they sensed that Army reinforcements were closing in.

Army units under Santos and local executives in the adjoining Kalamansig, Lebak and Palimbang towns in the seaside part of Sultan Kudarat and those in upland areas, among them leaders of indigenous tribes, together secured the surrender via backdoor talks of 126 CTG members in the past 14 months.