The military says members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) are frantically digging for firearms and ammunition reportedly buried by the Ampatuans in different places in Maguindanao.

The MILF is reportedly aided by remnants of the disbanded private army of the Ampatuans in digging for guns and ammo.

More than 400 militiamen loyal to the Ampatuans have joined the MILF, their former enemy, in retrieving the clan?s arsenal, according to the Armed Forces.

C?mon, guys, tell that to the Marines!

The military, police, MILF and remnants of the Ampatuans? private army are not after the guns and ammo, but caches of money of the Ampatuans.

It?s a free-for-all, finders-keepers kind of search.

Don?t be surprised if the combined military-police search groups shoot it out with the MILF-Ampatuan militia over the money.

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A very reliable source in the intelligence community said President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo ordered a search for the Ampatuans? money estimated at between P2 billion and P4 billion.

About P400 million was found by Army troopers in the vault of the Ampatuan mansion in Maguindanao during the short-lived martial law period.

An additional P120 million was found in the compound of the in-laws of Andal Ampatuan Jr. in the Moro province.

Whether the recovered amounts were turned over to Malacañang is not known, according to my intelligence source.

Arroyo ordered the search for the estimated P2 billion to P4 billion believed plundered by the Ampatuans from the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARRM) government.

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Are you surprised why the Ampatuans plundered the ARMM that they ruled for a couple of years?

The Ampatuans apparently adopted the ?monkey see, monkey do? attitude because the officialdom in Manila steals from the government.

The ARMM is a microcosm of the national government.

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The crash of the Nomad in Cotabato City has reduced the practically non-existent fleet of our Air Force.

With the grounding of all the remaining eight-passenger Nomads, if there are any left, the only fixed-wing aircraft that the Air Force can use as shuttle is the lone C-130 Hercules.

The Air Force has a few Huey helicopters left from an original fleet of 120 in its heyday.

Ours is probably the only air force in the world with no planes.

* * *

The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) has reportedly gotten wind of a plan to spring Andal Ampatuan Jr., principal suspect in the gruesome Maguindanao massacre, from the NBI jail.

If there is really such a plan, why don?t they strap a bomb on Ampatuan that can be detonated by remote control?

Let?s see if his accomplices would try to spring him from jail.

* * *

Andal Sr. is still confined at a hospital inside a military camp in Davao City.

He?s reportedly suffering from hypertension and other ailments needing his continued stay in the hospital.

The guy?s just pretending to be sick. He should be brought to Manila and detained while awaiting trial.

This is the same guy who didn?t have an attack of hypertension when he allegedly cut down with a chain saw people who crossed him.

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Former Solicitor General Frank Chavez called to say that former Social Welfare and now Health Secretary Esperanza Cabral is ?not vengeful, she?s not oppressive, she?s honest and above all, competent.?

Chavez was reacting to an item in this space Saturday that accused Cabral of oppressing a blogger who exposed the ?rotting? relief goods at the warehouse of the Department of Social Welfare and Development during Cabral?s watch.