NPA rebels torch tractor in Negros Occidental sugarcane farm

BACOLOD CITY, Philippines-Suspected communist rebels burned a P1-million tractor at a sugarcane farm in La Castellana town, Negros Occidental allegedly because the farm owners refused to pay revolutionary taxes to the assailants.

Authorities said six armed New People’s Army (NPA) rebels barged into the sugarcane farm of Delia Agustin-Espino in Hacienda Vicenta, Barangay (village) Cabacungan at about 6 a.m. Tuesday and ordered driver Hansel Carpio to get off the tractor.

Espino, president of LN Agustin Farms, is the mother of Bacolod City Councilor Al Victor Espino.

Carpio told police that the gunman poured gasoline on the tractor and set it on fire because the farm owners refused to pay so-called revolutionary taxes.

Councilor Espino said his family received extortion letters from the group introducing themselves as members of the Boy Gatmaitan Command in October, November and December last year.

His family, however, refused to give in to the demands of the rebels, he said.

Colonel Oscar Lactao, 303rd Infantry Brigade commander, has said the atrocities committed by the rebels should be condemned because these are blatant violations of human rights.

Lactao advised sugar farm owners to park their tractor and trucks near the police stations and army detachments.

On November 13, seven suspected rebels torched a sugarcane plantation and a 10-wheeler cargo truck of Barangay Captain Gerardo Titular in Barangay Carabalan, Himamaylan City.

The next day, two unidentified armed men also burned a cargo truck and a farm tractor in Barangay Tapi, Kabankalan City. The cost of damage, according to arson investigators, was an estimated P300,000.