‘Hot spot’ tag in some Mindanao areas eyed amid attacks on poll execs

HAPPIER TIME In this photo taken in August this year, Sulu provincial election supervisor Vidzfar Julie (second from right) attends a meeting to prepare for the satellite registration for former Moro rebels in Indanan town of the province. On Satuday, Julie is wounded in an ambush in Zamboanga City. —Contributed photo

MANILA, Philippines — The attempted murder of an election officer of Sulu province may be considered poll-related violence and could put areas in the Bangsamoro region as hot spots for next year’s elections.

According to Commission on Elections (Comelec) chair George Garcia, it was Sulu provincial election supervisor Vidzfar Amil Julie himself who said the ambush in Zamboanga City on Saturday morning, which killed his brother Naser Amil Asiri, had something to do with the upcoming polls.

READ: Election officer survives ambush in Zamboanga City – Comelec chief

“He is saying that the ambush was election-related and he was the target because he rejected some things that a few politicians have offered him. That’s our lead, and that’s what we are looking into, especially in the current investigation being conducted by the PNP (Philippine National Police),” Garcia said in an interview on dzBB on Sunday.

Julie, 51, and Asiri, 57, were inside a car when they were ambushed around 10:30 a.m. on Saturday in Barangay Sta. Maria, Zamboanga City.

The siblings were traveling en route to their home in the city from Zamboanga International Airport when two unidentified men on a motorcycle pulled alongside their vehicle and opened fire.

Julie, who had just arrived from Jolo, was driving his sport utility vehicle with Asiri, who picked him up in the airport, sitting in the passenger seat.

Julie was unharmed, but Asiri died in the hospital after suffering from a gunshot in the head. Asiri was a barangay official of Paugan in Parang town of Sulu.

Cowards

After he was declared safe from harm, Julie took to social media to slam his attackers as “cowards” for not facing him squarely.

Speaking to the Inquirer by phone on Saturday, Julie affirmed the attack was “work-related.”

He said they had just reached Villa Santa Maria when two men aboard a white motorcycle and wearing black jackets with full-face helmets rained bullets on them from behind the vehicle.

Julie added that the attackers chased them until they reached home.

Julie managed to drive Asiri to the West Metro Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

The remains of Asiri were brought to Sulu on Saturday.

According to Garcia, this has been the third “incident of violence” against a personnel of Comelec since the filing of certificate of candidacy in October.

Garcia was referring to the separate killings of two election officials in Lanao del Norte and Sultan Kudarat provinces.

On Nov. 23, John Nico Pandoy, the assistant election officer of Isulan, Sultan Kudarat, but detailed as acting election officer of President Quirino in the same province, was driving his motorcycle on his way home in President Quirino when shot in the head by two men riding tandem on a motorbike.

On Nov. 25, Mark Orlando Vallecer II, the acting election officer of Nunungan town in Lanao del Norte, was shot dead by a still unidentified assailant in Barangay Curva of Salvador town, also in Lanao del Norte.

Such violence could be a ground for Comelec to declare such places as “areas of concern,” or placed under Comelec control, where the poll body can sideline the authority of local government units to suppress potential election-related violence.

Garcia said Comelec would not be cowered by these violent incidents in performing their duties.

“If someone is not satisfied with what our people are doing, especially when they are planning something bad and our personnel want it stopped, they will really find a way to get their schemes done,” the poll chief insinuated, without naming names.

He added, “I will not change my provincial election supervisors. I maintain that they should be in their respective areas because they know the place. If the bad politicians could not have them replaced, they would rather have them killed just to get their own way.”