Authorities retake villages in Antipas NPAs occupied for a day

NORTH COTABATO --- The police and military had cleared hinterland villages in Antipas, North Cotabato from occupation by rebels after 12 hours of operations that began Thursday night.Four bands of New People’s Army (NPA) guerillas arrived in Barangay Camutan in Antipas before dawn Thursday, looted houses and robbed villagers of money, farm animals and grains in their barns before ordering them to leave at gun point.Antipas Mayor Egidio Cadungon, chairperson of the municipal peace and order council, announced on Friday night that evacuees can start returning to the barrios government forces had cleared from NPA occupation.The NPA’s plunder of Barangay Camutan, a highland area in Antipas, dislocated hundreds of families, now confined in evacuation sites in safer areas.Evacuees are reluctant to return home fearing a possible return of the NPAs after the state forces that drove them away have returned to their command posts. Image may contain 3 people people standing sand//scontent.fmnl3-2.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/17498926_1449118901812295_6881527511754061691_n.jpg?oh=9a58ba730763d66e33c211ac502a6c35andampoe=596B99D6 The NPAs are very ruthless. They collect food and money and are so cruel in persecuting poor people on mere suspicion of connivance with the military, a 63-year-old farmer, who asked to be identified only as Ruben, told reporters in Cebuano dialect.He is one of more than a thousand villagers who evacuated from Barangay Camutan, which is close to mountain ranges where there is heavy NPA presence.Barangay officials had also confirmed the NPA’s recruitment activities in the conflict-torn barangay. Parents that refuse to let their children join the NPA gets harmed, one of the sources, who asked not to be identified for security reasons, told reporters.The rebels who attacked Barangay Camutan, led by Alvin Gulmatico, belong to the NPA’s Guerilla Front 73, which is feared for its impunity.While personnel of the North Cotabato provincial police office and the 39thInfantry Battalion figured in intermittent clashes with NPAs in Barangay Camutan, rebels also attacked a detachment of militiamen in Tampakan town in South Cotabato.Senior Inspector Harold Cornel of the Tampakan municipal police said the NPAs attacked from two directions the detachment in Barangay Tablu at past 8and00 a.m. Friday, sparking a gunfight that lasted about two hours.Members of the Citizens Armed Forces Geographical Unit (CAFGU) guarding the fortified outpost returned fire, preventing the NPAs, who belong to the Guerilla Front 72, from breaching the fence encircling their position.The rebels scampered away when they sensed that responding personnel of the Army’s 27th Infantry Battalion and the South Cotabato provincial police were closing in.Supt. Romeo Galgo, Jr., spokesman of the Regional Police Office-12, said the incident caused panic among villagers.Police and Army intelligence units said the NPA attacked the CAFGU detachment in Barangay Tablu for being obstacle to the movement of rebels collecting protection money from villagers.