Ex-vice mayor and now state school exec hurt in North Cotabato abmush

KIDAPAWAN CITY– An official of a state-owned college institution in North Cotabato was wounded when a still unidentified gunman shot him while traversing the national highway in President Roxas, around 810 a.m., Saturday, a police officer said. Superintendent Bernard Tayong, spokesperson for the Cotabato Police Provincial Office (CPPO), identified the victim as Cedric Mantawil, planning officer of the Cotabato Foundation College for Science and Technology (CFCST), a government-owned institution located in Barangay Doruluman, Arakan, North Cotabato. Tayong said the victim, onboard his Honda City car, was on his way to Kidapawan City when one of the two motorists that started to tail him from CFCST shot him twice. The suspects, both onboard a black Honda XRM motorcycle, exited towards the hinterland portion of President Roxas, while the victim was rushed to the Cotabato Provincial Hospital at Amas complex, this city, for treatment. Investigators recovered from the crime scene one spent shell coming from a caliber 45 pistol, which, reports said, was used in the gun attack. Mantawil sustained gunshot wounds on his left arm. A student from CFCST who was seated next to Mantawil survived the attack. Police Officer 2 Joey Failano, one of the investigators, said that Mantawil was maneuvering a blind curve along Barangay Greenhills when he was shot. The victim stopped his tinted car after he was shot, which made the suspects believed he got killed during the attack.The gunmen immediately fled from the scene when onlookers and bystanders rushed to the site after they heard gunshots. Police are still digging their probe as to motives and those behind the attack. Mantawil, before his assignment at CFCST as planning officer, vice mayor ofKabacan town and one of the members of the Board of Trustees of the University of Southern Mindanao (USM) Main Campus.