NPAs torch passenger van in Maasin, Sarangani
Local News • 14:50 PM Thu Nov 9, 2017
1,295
By:
Edwin O. Fernandez
Personnel of PNP Regional Public Safety Battalion conduct checkpoints after rebels torched passenger van in Maasin, Sarangani. (RPSB twitter)
GENERAL SANTOS CITY – Suspected communist rebels
torched a passenger van plying this city to the coastal town of Maasim Tuesday
night, police said today.
Senior Fire Officer Ramil Lacaba, Maasim fire
marshall, said in a radio interview the van loaded with three was heading to
Maitum when at Barangay Lumasal, Maasin, Sarangani, it was flagged down by
gunmen at past 8 p.m.
The van (VFP-475) owned and driven byRey Napilas,has no scheduled stopover in Barangay
Lumasal. But one of the passengers asked he van driver to pull
over.
It was then that armed men emerged from nowhere,
ordered the driver and passengers to disembark and set the vehicle on fire.
The suspects, declaring they were communist rebels,
fled on motorbikes.
Public transport had been the subject of New
Peoples’ Army harassment the past months in Sarangani.
Recent attacks include burning of delivery van of
KCC Malls of Gensan in Malapatan, Sarangani. This year, several buses, delivery
trucks and construction and multi-national firms were torched and admitted by
suspected NPAs. (Edwin O. Fernandez)