COTABATO CITY––Town officials of Parang, Maguindanao have offered a P50,000 reward for anyone who could give information that would lead to the arrest of the suspect in Sunday’s bus bombing in this city that hurt six passengers.
Parang Mayor Cahar Ibay said he would immediately release the amount without question to anyone who could identify and help arrest the bomber whose police artist’s sketch and CCTV footage had been made public.
“I am hoping that this bounty will help fast track the identification and eventual arrest of the suspect,” Ibay told reporters.
The Parang police on Monday, April 25, released a police artist’s sketch of the suspect, whose image was captured by the close circuit television (CCTV) alighting from the Rural Tours bus parked for a brief stopover in Parang on its way to Dipolog City.
Lt. Colonel Cristio Lagyop, speaking for the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao police, said two improvised bombs with a mobile phone as triggering device ripped through the bus rear.
The bus was carrying 27 passengers from General Santos City, when the explosion took place at past 7 a.m. on Sunday.
Bomb experts defused a secondary bomb found in the bus.
No one has claimed responsibility, but the police are looking at business rivalry as a possible angle in the bombing.
Some groups are reportedly against the operation of the Rural Tours along the Cotabato to Pagadian route since it alienated passenger vans plying the same route.
While passenger vans collect P1,000 to P1,500 per passenger along the Cotabato to Pagadian route, the Rural Tours charged P800 per person.