Originally Posted by
gnox
NPA blasts airport project
21 guns seized in Negros attack
By Carla Gomez
Inquirer
Last updated 02:08am (Mla time) 10/09/2006
Published on page A1 of the October 9, 2006 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
BACOLOD CITY -- Rebuffed in their demands for protection money, communist New People’s Army rebels yesterday blew up P30 million worth of equipment being used to build a major airport that has been billed as a part of President Gloria Macapagal- Arroyo’s mega projects, officials said.
No one was hurt in the 2 a.m. attack on the Japanese-funded P4.3-billion project in nearby Silay City, but the guerrillas escaped with dozens of guns seized from the guards.
“This is an act of terrorism and economic sabotage,” Silay Mayor Carlo Gamban said. “It is the poor people who will suffer from the delay in the work because the airport will create many job opportunities and other businesses in the area.”
A band of about 30 guerrillas carried out the attack, bombing the computerized batching plant and cement paver owned by the Korean firm, Hanjin International, and the power generator of the Japanese company, Takinaka Itochu.
The rebels took only 30 minutes to disarm the guards and blow up the equipment, Gamban said.
The Negros Occidental airport project, located 14 kilometers north of Bacolod, is funded partly by the Japan Bank for International Cooperation and was scheduled for completion in the second quarter of next year, Transportation Assistant Secretary Ricardo Tan said.
The military has accused the NPA of collecting so-called revolutionary taxes to help finance its operations after its foreign funding dried up.
It said the NPA collects at least P30 million a month in protection money in Mindanao, P20 million a month in Central Luzon, and about the same amount in the Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal and Quezon) area.
The rebel targets include business companies and individuals, such as politicians.
At least eight attacks by NPA rebels demanding such taxes had been reported during the past year. These included raids on the facilities of Globe Telecom Inc. and bus companies.
In August, Akbayan party-list Representative Loretta Ann “Etta” Rosales condemned the NPA’s torching of a truck owned by AlterTrade Corp. in Bacolod as proof of “the darker side of the revolutionary forces.”
The Silay airport was one of the priority mega-projects cited by Ms Arroyo in her State of the Nation Address in July.
21 guns plus radios
Negros Occidental Gov. Joseph Marañon said the attack would have an adverse impact on the province’s economy.
“By hampering the construction of the airport, the rebels will delay needed economic progress for the people with the job opportunities it will create, and vital tourism development,” Marañon said.
The rebels, led by a certain Sakay and armed with high-powered firearms, used improvised explosive devices made of gasoline and fertilizer, Army Colonel Felicisimo Budiongan said.
Budiongan said the rebels carted away 18 .38-cal. revolvers, three shotguns, and eight handheld radios.
Oplan Hakot Armas
Twenty-one security guards were disarmed.
Budiongan said the rebels staged the attack after the project builders refused to pay revolutionary taxes.
He said the rebels had sent the firm an extortion letter asking for an unspecified amount.
“This is also part of the NPA’s Oplan Hakot Armas to collect firearms to give to its new recruits,” Budiongan said.
Tan said he would discuss with the contractors “how the project could be finished on schedule in spite of the bombing, by possibly tapping the use of a local batching plant.”
Officials said a security detachment would be placed at the airport site to protect the area from further attacks.
Police said the attack could delay completion of the project for several months.
South Korean engineers and Filipino workers who live at the site were not harmed, Silay police chief Superintendent Celestino Guara said. He said that Japanese engineers were staying at a hotel away from the site.
Army troops and policemen were pursuing the attackers.
The rebels have about 7,200 fighters operating in 5 percent of all villages nationwide and attack rural troops, police and businesses who refuse their extortion demands, according to the military.
Two years ago, the rebels withdrew from Norwegian-brokered peace talks on ending 37 years of their insurgency, saying the Arroyo administration was not making efforts to remove them from the US and European lists of terrorist organizations. With a report from Associated Press
30 rebels attack Silay airport
Reply With Quote
Posting Permissions
