Bus bombing suspect is jail escapee

KIDAPAWAN CITY—The main suspect in the bombing on Tuesday of a bus passing near a university in Bukidnon had been in jail for a previous terror attack but was rescued by armed men during a raid on the detention facility at least seven years ago.

Macmod Manibpil (not Dautin Gondak as earlier reported), had been charged in connection with the bombing on Tuesday of a Rural Transit bus in Maramag, Bukidnon.

He has been a fugitive since he was rescued from the North Cotabato provincial jail by armed men on Feb. 2, 2007.

Manibpil had been arrested in 2007 for his involvement in a series of bombings in North Cotabato starting in 2003.

On the day he was rescued, 46 other inmates bolted the detention facility in the village of Amas here.

According to Joselito Pinol, mayor of M’lang town in North Cotabato province, Manibpil has since joined the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF), a guerrilla group composed of former members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front who refuse to accept the MILF’s peace deal with the Aquino administration.

Bukidnon Gov. Jose Maria Zubiri said although Manibpil is a BIFF member, he did not believe that the group, founded by former MILF leader Ameril Umra Kato in 2008, was involved in the bombing as an organization.

“This is purely extortion,” he said, citing instances when the Rural Mindanao Transit Inc. (RMTI), owner of the Rural Transit bus that was bombed, received extortion letters and text messages.

At least 11 people died and 41 others, many of them students of the Central Mindanao University (CMU) in Maramag, were injured when the bomb tore through the bus bearing body number 2640.

The blast took place after the bus picked up passengers outside the CMU campus in Barangay Dologon in Maramag.

Maj. Christian Uy, spokesperson of the Cagayan de Oro City-based 4th Infantry Division, said the military had suspected that a certain Dawtin Gendang, who is behind another bomb attack in Bukidnon in November, was also behind the attack on the Rural Transit bus.

But an artist’s sketch of the suspect in Tuesday’s blast matched a photo of Manibpil, which the police had kept.

Chief Supt. Isagani Genabe Jr., Northern Mindanao police director, later said Manibpil is a BIFF member.

BIFF had denied involvement in the attack saying it would not benefit from killing civilians.

Senior Supt. Glenn Dela Torre, Bukidnon police chief, said Manibpil was identified through the testimony of a witness, who survived the bus bombing on Tuesday.

He said the witness, a driver who was on his day off, saw Manibpil ride the bombed bus and disembark from it prior to the blast.

The witness saw Manibpil holding what looked to the witness as a battery inside the bus before the bombing.

Manibpil, according to Dela Torre, boarded the bus in the village of Barandias in Pangantucan town. The suspect disembarked a few meters from CMU, Dela Torre said.

Forensic tests showed that the bomb used in Tuesday’s attack was similar to the improvised explosive device (IED) used in the July 2013 bombing of Lim Ket Kai mall in Cagayan de Oro City which killed six people and wounded dozens of others.

Fragments of the IED showed the bomb was made out of a mortar shell. It was remotely detonated, said Dela Torre. Williamor Magbanua and Nash Maulana, Inquirer Mindanao