Probers still clueless on fatal ambush of ARMM employee

MAGUINDANAO --- Investigators are still clueless on the fatal ambush on Saturday in Datu Odin Sinsuat, Maguindanao of a staff of Gov. Mujiv Hataman of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.The fatality, Betsy Yap of ARMM’s Humanitarian Emergency Assistance and Response Team, known in the autonomous region as HEART, died from a gunshot wound in the head.The HEART, a rapid deployment contingent providing assistance and rehabilitation services to calamity and conflict-stricken areas in the autonomous region, is operating under the direct control of Hataman, now in his second term as ARMM’s regional governor. Image may contain 1 person car and outdoor sand//scontent.fcgy1-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/31944759_10216414601385895_6093016218728398848_n.jpg?_nc_cat=0andampoh=2e0e804925f69d10c2cd8f9b5a7086a5andampoe=5B8ADD17 (The victims' vehicle being inspected by police)Yap and her mother, Beatrize, a member of the Sangguniang Bayan in South Upi, were on board a car en route to Cotabato City from Barangay Tenorio in Datu Odin Sinsuat town when men armed with pistols opened fire from one side of the road and hurriedly escaped.South Upi, a hinterland municipality in the second district of Maguindanao, is a politically hostile town, whose mayor, Reynalbert Insular, survived an ambush and, subsequently, a roadside bombing last year.Chief Supt. Graciano Mijares of the Police Regional Office-ARMM said personnel of the Datu Odin Sinsuat municipal police and probers from the Maguindanao provincial police office are still investigating on the incident.Hataman, chairman of ARMM’s inter-agency regional peace and order council, has asked Armed Forces chief Lt. Gen. Carlito Galvez, Jr. to dispatch military intelligence agents to help the police identify the culprits. The PRO-ARMM is doing its best to identify them and file corresponding charges against them. There is a big possibility they were hired by a mastermind, Hataman said. Image may contain 1 person smiling sand//scontent.fcgy1-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/31946741_10216414600185865_7625867098660536320_n.jpg?_nc_cat=0andampoh=6863257f9672164bf3f84f940145eaa0andampoe=5B5BD1D7 (Betsy Yap)There are talks spreading around purporting that it was Yap’s mother who was the target of the ambush. I leave everything to the police. I don’t have any idea of anybody wanting to have me killed, Beatrize said Sunday morning.She said their ambushers must have presumed it was her seated on the front seat of their heavily tinted car, where they aimed most of their shots. We changed seats before we were fired at. I sat on the backseat and she took the front seat beside the driver, Yap’s mother said in between sobs.Hataman and Maguindanao Gov. Esmael Mangudadatu had separately condemned the incident.The crime scene is less than a kilometer away from Camp Siongco, the command center of the Army’s 6thInfantry Division, central Mindanao’s largest military installation.Mangudadatu said he is ready to offer a cash incentive to any informant who can help the police identify the killers of Yap.Mangudadatu wants the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group-ARMM to help put closure to the case.