NEWSBRIEFS

‘No more leaking’

The leaking of bunker fuel from a sunken vessel between Iloilo province and Guimaras Island has stopped, said Coast Guard Western Visayas commander Commodore Athelo Ybañez on Saturday.

There had been no signs of leaking from MV Sportigo for several days, he said. “We are continuously monitoring until the vessel is removed,” he told the Inquirer.

MV Sportigo lies about 27 meters below the sea in the middle of Iloilo Strait between Iloilo and Guimaras. The cargo ship, which was anchored off the port of Iloilo, sank on Jan. 19 after it dragged its anchor and collided with another anchored vessel, MV Jehan 5.

The cargo ship sank with 12,000 liters of bunker fuel and its cargo of 28,000 bags of fertilizer.

Officials and coastal villagers of Guimaras had been placed on alert after traces of bunker fuel believed to be coming from the sunken vessel reached the shores of the island province days after the sinking. The bunker fuel contaminated rocks and debris. Nestor P. Burgos Jr., Inquirer Visayas

BULACAN

Mayor survives crash

Malolos City Mayor Christian Natividad survived a car accident in Barangay (village) Sto. Cristo in Pulilan town on Thursday night, but one of his security aides died and two others were hurt in the crash, police said.

Reports said Natividad’s group came from Barangay Taal in Pulilan and was on its way to Malolos when a truck hit the mayor’s Mitsubishi Montero Sport along the Maharlika Highway intersection in Sto. Cristo at 10:15 p.m.

Supt. Helson Walin, Pulilan police chief, said Roderick Santiago, 30, one of the mayor’s security personnel, died while being taken to Bulacan Medical Center in Malolos. Carmela Reyes-Estrope, Inquirer Central Luzon

LAGUNA

Media office ransacked

The office of a weekly newspaper based in San Pedro City was ransacked by still unidentified men early Saturday.

Ray Junia, the owner of the newspaper called Opinyon, said the break-in was discovered by his caretaker around 2 a.m., a few hours after they closed the pages for the week before midnight on Friday. He said the newspaper tackled controversies involving the government and the business sector.

He said the burglars entered the office, located on the ground floor of a three-story commercial center in Barangay San Vicente here, through a hole where an air-conditioner used to be. Among the items stolen, he said, were a small amount of cash, documents and two  laptop computers. The police were still investigating the burglary, he said. Maricar Cinco, Inquirer Southern Luzon