NPA rebs burn road equipment in Kudarat

ISULAN, SULTAN KUDARAT — Suspected communist rebels torched heavy equipment being used for road construction in the upland village of Hinalaan in Kalamansig, Sultan Kudarat, a police report said.

Chief Supt. Eliseo Tam Rasco, police regional director for the Soccsksargen region, told the Inquirer that gunmen in fatigues, believed to be New People’s Army (NPA) guerrillas and numbering about 20, arrived at the construction site of Janmerc Construction Co. at 4:50 a.m. Monday and set ablaze several construction equipment.

Rasco said authorities counted at least eight pieces of heavy equipment set on fire by the rebels.

Seven of the construction equipment were torched in the village center of Hinalaan while a backhoe was burned in another location in the same village.

Among the burned equipment were payloader, cement mixer, cargo truck, road roller, dump truck and backhoe.

Marines

Rasco said policemen and Marines had been deployed to Hinalaan, one of the upland villages of the coastal town of Kalamansig where communist rebels operate.

Janmerc construction firm is completing a road concreting project from Ninoy Aquino to Kalamansig, both in Sultan Kudarat province.

A police official said the communist rebels have been “mulcting” the construction firm, demanding revolutionary taxes and “protection money” so it can continue road construction.

The demand was repeatedly denied by the firm management.