No clues yet on murder in Maguindanao of ex-Jolo cop chief
Mindanao Armed Conflict • 11:00 AM Sun Nov 22, 2020
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By:
John M. Unson
Screengrab from Senate of the Philippines YouTube Channel during inquiry on the Jolo shooting.
MAGUINDANAO --- Authorities are clueless yet on Saturday’s murder of the former police chief of Jolo whose subordinates then shot dead four Army agents in a mysterious encounter in June.
The 41-year-old Lt. Col. Walter Annayo, not a captain as stated in an initial report from the municipal police station in Sultan Mastura town in Maguindanao, died on the spot from bullet wounds sustained in the attack.
Annayo had just alighted from his Toyota Fortuner sports utility vehicle to buy buco juice from a vending stall along a stretch of the Secretary Narciso Ramos Highway in Barangay Macabiso, Sultan Mastura when his attackers riding another SUV came close and opened fire.
Brig. Gen. Samuel Rodriguez, director of the Police Regional Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region, on Sunday ordered an extensive search for Annayo's killers.
Annayo, who hailed from Baguio City, was reassigned to the PRO-BAR headquarters in Camp SK Pendatun in Parang, Maguindanao after the controversial incident in Jolo, capital town of Sulu.
Annayo was chief of the police station in Jolo that hit the news after a team of local policemen shot dead in a busy spot in that southern town four agents of the Army’s Intelligence Service Unit, Major Marvin Indammog and companions Captain Irwin Managuelod, Sgt. Eric Velasco and Corporal Abdal Asula, in an alleged shootout that has since remained unsolved.
Indammog was then commanding officer of the Army’s ISU unit in Region 9 covering the Zamboanga Peninsula and the provinces of Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi in the Bangsamoro region.
In a report to PRO-BAR’s headquarters, the Sultan Mastura police station said the killers of Annayo fled towards the direction of Parang, a seaside town in the first district of Maguindanao province.
Intelligence agents from units of the Philippine Navy’s 1st Marine Brigade covering Maguindanao’s neighboring Sultan Kudarat, Sultan Mastura, and Parang towns have been mobilized to help the PRO-BAR identify the culprits.
Brig. Gen. Jonas Lumawag, commander of the 1st Marine Brigade, has directed their agents to enlist the support of barangay folk in helping the PRO-BAR establish the identities of the gunmen behind the murder of Annayo.