Peace worker target of bomb attack in Cotabato City – police

Police and military personnel inspect a burnt vehicle after a powerful bomb exploded in Cotabato city, southern Philippines on Monday Aug. 5, 2013. AP FILE PHOTO

COTABATO CITY – Authorities here said Tuesday’s bomb attack that injured a soldier and a sidewalk vendor could have been intended for the man who owned the jeep where the bomb was planted.

Senior Superintendent Rolen Balquin, city police director, said the attack appeared to be an offshoot of a grudge involving Esmael Abdullah, who has been working with the Sajahatra Bangsamoro, the peace and development program that the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) have been jointly implementing.

Balquin said the improvised explosive device – fashioned from a 60-millimeter mortar shell fitted with a remote detonator – was tucked under Abdullah’s jeep.

Abdullah had parked the jeep along the busy Makakua St. to buy medicines.

He had barely entered a pharmacy when the improvised bomb exploded around 8:30 p.m. and hit Private Dondon Bambao, 23, of the 5th Special Forces; and Baingan Aliuden Ango, 45, a sidewalk vendor. Three other persons were also rushed to the hospital but it turned out they did not sustain any injury.

“We are inclined to believe he was the target,” he said.

Abdulla, a former professor at the Mindanao State University in Datu Odin Sinsuat, Maguindanao, said though that he was not aware he had enemies and that he had not receive any death threat.

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