| NPA disarmed Bansalan militiamen |
| Written by Eldie S. Aguirre and Nilo Cobrado | |
| Thursday, 10 July 2008 | |
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More or less 60 fully armed NPA rebels stormed Barangay Managa, Bansalan town in Davao del Sur and carted away four shotguns from civilian volunteers of Sitio Balagonon on Sunday evening.
Purok Chairman Rolly Teofilo; Alberto Camansi; Jimmy Gonzales and Emmanuel Abatayo: all members of the civilian volunteers’ organization (CVO) of Barangay Managa were surprised over the attack and failed to resist when the rebels took their firearms.
Major Lyndon Paniza, 39th Infantry Battalion (IB) commander immediately ordered his troop to conduct follow up operations in the mountain ranges of Bansalan to get rid of the rebels he theorized as members of the NPA’s Front Committee-51 under the command of Ka Marvin.
This developed when the police and the military were placed on heightened alert after the intelligence community received information that the rebels will launch tactical offensives in different parts of the province.
Supt. Cesario Darantinao, Davao del Sur PNP director ordered a round-the-clock full alert status in all parts of the province to deter the rebels’ plot to initiate an attack on government facilities and installations.
“We must be vigilant at all times as not to give chance for the rebels to pursue their plans,” Darantinao said.
The recent attack proved the government-initiated heightened alert failed to dissuade rebels from harassing remote villages in the province.
Just recently, Governor Douglas Cagas – the newly appointed Regional Peace and Order Council (RPOC) chairman in Southern Mindanao announced plans to conduct a dialogue with the NPA and the MILF to prevent further bloodshed and loss of lives from both sides.
“Fierce firefight and exchange of bullets could not put an end to this decades’ old conflict. It is high time for us to put all these things in the right perspective,” Cagas said in a media interview.
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