SHARIFF AGUAK, MAGUINDANAO?Authorities yesterday failed to retrieve the remains of a backhoe operator believed to have been executed in order to silence him about the Nov. 23 massacre in Maguindanao.

A police team headed by Chief Supt. Felicisimo Khu, with representatives from the Commission on Human Rights, went to Sitio Kalat, Old Maganoy, to exhume the body of Hamid Dilayudin from what is believed to have been his grave but came up empty.

?[But] it appears the area was dug up anew and the remains transferred somewhere else,? said Supt. Alex Lenesis, the acting police chief of Maguindanao.

Khu said there were signs that the ground had been freshly dug and the surroundings gave off a foul smell.

Dilayudin has been identified as the operator of the excavating machine that was used to dig up days in advance the grave site in Barangay Salman in Ampatuan town where the victims of the Nov. 23 massacre would be buried.

Lenesis said that police had received information that Dilayudin, an employee of the provincial government that owned the backhoe, was executed to prevent him from issuing a statement on the gruesome murders.

The police team went to Old Maganoy to retrieve Dilayudin?s body after receiving a tip from civilian informants who said Dilayudin had been kidnapped by members of the paramilitary Civilian Volunteer Organization (CVO).

The backhoe operator was killed and buried in a grave site near a banana plantation in Old Maganoy, the informants said.

According to Lenesis, they also suspect that there was an attempt to conceal the grave site by covering it with burned banana stalks.

In Manila, CHR Chair Leila de Lima described the grave site as being in a barangay some seven kilometers from the highway in Ampatuan and adjacent to the main massacre site.

De Lima said that one of the informants had said that three massacre victims, probably including Dilayudin and Reynaldo Momay, the correspondent of the Gen. Santos City-based Midland Tribune, were buried in the site.

Momay and the backhoe operator were used as human shields by the fleeing perpetrators of the massacre, she said.

Lenesis said the search will continue for the remains of Dilayudin, if he has indeed been killed, and other missing people, including Momay.

?We continue our search and retrieval as long as there are still missing persons related to the Maguindanao massacre,? he said, while calling on Dilayudin and Momay to come out if they are alive.

The team earlier went to a reported grave site in Datu Abdullah Sangki town, Maguindanao, to retrieve the remains of Dilayudin but was similarly unsuccessful.

A man who identified himself as Efren Macanas earlier surrendered to the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group in Koronadal City to deny involvement in the massacre.

Macanas admitted to having been one of three people assigned to operate the excavator belonging to the Maguindanao engineering office.

He told investigators that the backhoe he was operating was last driven by Dilayudin on Nov. 23.

Asked if it can be said that there were more than 57 massacre victims, De Lima said this cannot be officially confirmed until the other bodies are found.

?But what appears definite is that Momay was indeed part of the convoy and remains missing. Hamid is the backhoe operator,? she said.

On Nov. 23, about 100 men believed to be led by Mayor Andal Ampatuan Jr. of Datu Unsay town, flagged down a six-vehicle convoy from Buluan, Maguindanao.

The convoy, led by Genalin Mangudadatu, wife of Buluan Vice Mayor Esmael Mangudadatu, was on its way to Shariff Aguak to file the candidacy papers of Mangudadatu who was challenging Ampatuan Jr. for the Maguindanao governorship in the 2010 elections.

Accompanying Genalin were relatives and supporters and at least 31 journalists from the cities of Tacurong, Koronadal and General Santos.

A few hours later, they would all be found dead in Sitio Masalay. Some of the victims had been buried with three vehicles, while others were shot in the head.

The massacre shocked the country and the entire world.

Andal Jr. has been arrested and charged with multiple murder and is now detained at the National Bureau of Investigation in Manila.

Also arrested were his father, Andal Ampatuan Sr., and brothers Anwar, Zaldy and Sajid, along with other relatives. They are all facing rebellion charges.