SAN JOSE DE BUAN, Samar – A father of six young kids who also happens to be a village chief went missing last December 11, and some military officials said the underground movement could be responsible for his disappearance.
According to the same speculators, the barangay leader decided to stop giving revolutionary tax to the members of the New People’s Army (NPA) operating in the boundary of this province with other Samar provinces.
In a related development, a barangay official in barangay Kapatagan, Laak, Compostela Valley province, was shot dead by an alleged NPA hit squad in the morning of January 12.
Lt. Col. Francisco I. Simbajon, a military spokesman, said Ruben Celeste, a barangay councilman, was working on his farm when two unidentified armed men shot him at close range several times at 7 a.m. on January 12.
Simbajon said that sketchy reports claimed that the assailants were members of a special partisan operations unit (Sparrow) of Front Committee 34 of the NPA, which is led by the Southern Mindanao Regional Committee of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP).
Celeste had been active in the anti-insurgency campaign, according to Simbajon, and his involvement in the punitive drive against the NPA could have been the motive for his execution.
The councilman was shot several times with a cal. .45 pistol.
Friends and relatives of the Samar barangay official, Peter Dacles, of barangay Cataydungan, this town, also expressed fears that he could be dead by now.
His wife, Salvacion, and some residents believe that he was abducted by members of the Arnulfo Ortiz Command (AOC) of the Samar Front Central Committee of the Eastern Visayas Regional Party Committee (SFCC-EVRPC).
The victim’s wife claimed that since her husband decided to stop contributing "revolutionary tax" to the underground government in March 2005, her husband continuously received a "stern warning" coming from the rebels’ leader, a certain "Kumander Payong."
"If you will not meet me and give your share, something bad will happen to you and one of your family members," the NPA leader was quoted by the victim’s wife as saying.
Cataydungan purportedly provides R4,000 as monthly contribution to the revolutionary movement monthly. The money is sourced from the regular Internal Revenue Allotment (IRA) of the village, according to village leaders.
The victim planned to leave for Calbayog City along with his family on December 12 but he realized he could not flee from the long arm of the revolutionary movement and decided to meet with the NPA officers a day before he disappeared.
At 4:30 p.m. on December 11, he was reported abducted.
|
