DIGOS CITY, Davao del Sur, Philippines—Unidentified men armed with .45 caliber pistols torched a Davao City-bound unit of Yellow Bus Line (YBL) in Barangay (village) Kanapulo in Magsaysay, Davao del Sur around 9 a.m. Saturday.
The attack was the third involving YBL units in Central Mindanao and Southern Mindanao.
Col. Ronnie Felix Babac, 73rd Infantry Battalion commander, said the bus, which had five passengers, came from Sultan Kudarat province and was traversing the Magsaysay portion of the Davao-Cotabato highway when flagged down by the suspects in Kanapulo.
After ordering the bus crew and the passengers to alight, the armed men – numbering about five – doused the bus with gasoline and set it on fire.
Babac said the suspects fled toward Makilala town in North Cotabato.
On Wednesday and on November 13, suspected New People’s Army rebels also torched two YBL buses.
Wednesday’s incident took place in Barangay Katubao in Kiamba, Sarangani province according to Supt. Romeo Galgo, the spokesperson of the Central Mindanao police.
Galgo said extortion was eyed as the motive behind the attack and that of Nov. 13, when NPA rebels also set afire a YBL unit in Barangay Kablon inTupi, South Cotabato.
READ: Gunmen torch bus in South Cotabato
YBL was among Mindanao’s oldest family-controlled bus companies. It was owned by the Yaps of South Cotabato and services the provinces of Sarangani, South Cotabato, Sultan Kudarat, portions of Maguindanao, and Davao del Sur. With a report from Edwin Fernandez