‘Punitive action for army’s abduction of 4 female, 2 male students’: 7 troopers killed in Mt Prov- Abra boundary NPA ambush

By GINA DIZON, FREDDIE G. LAZARO AND AD

SAGADA, Mountain Province -- Seven troopers of the army’s 41st Infantry Battalion were killed when New People’s Army guerillas ambushed them along a road at Barangay Wangayan, Tubo, Abra last week. Tubo is a few hours hike from Sagada.

The firefight started at 8 a.m. and lasted until 2:30 p.m. on June 25. The NPAs didn’t have any casualty, Ka Diego Wadagan, spokesman of the NPA’s Agustin Begnalen Command bared a press statement saying the ambush was “punitive action against the many abuses of the operating troops.”

An army press dispatch however said the “fight started at about 7 to 7:30 a.m. on June 25 between operating troops of the army’s Charlie Coy of the 41st IB and the NPAs with undetermined number of CTs with unknown leader at said place.”

The army said “there were two wounded in action on the government while still undetermined number on the enemy side. Recovered at the site were one landmine, four back pack and subversive documents.”

The army said at about 11:50 a.m. during same date and place, another firefight ensued resulting to the killing of one soldier.

Wadagan said the ambush was prompted by the “abduction of six innocent high school students along the Bangaan-Buasao-Kili foot trail in Sagada by the army soldiers.”

Wadagan identified the six students as Josie Padingil?, Josefa Banglay?, Jane Dumalig?, Isabel Lawagan?, Igan Lumebyang?, and Sumili Maguinsay.

The six students were reportedly released on June 25. “The female students were released earlier, while Igan Lumebyang and Sumili Maguinsay were only released after the people of Kili and neighboring villages exerted pressure on the military to release them,” Wadagan said.

Lumebyang and Maguinsay were reportedly brought by the troops garbed in camouflage uniforms.

After learning of the ambush, the people of Tubo reportedly said, "Masem yu, aped yu tiliwen nan an-ak mi ay maid basbasol da. Pinaligat yu, binutbuteng yu sa yu pay insarang as peggad daida." (That's what you get for abducting innocent children. You tormented, terrorized and exposed them to danger.)

“Col. Loreto G. Rirao, 503rd Brigade Commanding Officer, tried to cover up the abduction by stupidly claiming that the students got lost in the way and so the soldiers accompanied them,” Wadagan said.

“How can the students get lost when they have been hiking that trail every time they go to school?”

Military deployment
Since June 5, massive military deployment began in the towns of Bontoc, Sagada, and Besao in Mountain Province; in the towns of Luba, Tubo and Boliney in Abra and in Cervantes and Quirino in the province of Ilocos Sur.

The Armed Forces of the Philippines and Philippine National Police troops reportedly included the 41st IB, 50th IB, 53rd Recon Coy, 21st IB, and the PNP RMG-CAR.

Earlier on June 17, an encounter transpired at Sitio Pananuman, Tubtuba, Tubo with NPA guerillas and a unit of the 50th IB.

A soldier was reportedly killed while the NPA suffered no casualties.

Wadagan said the AFP-PNP have been committing human rights violations and black propaganda, aside from spreading lies about the CPP-NPA's alleged plot to assassinate local government officials in the province.

“These were a clear scapegoat for the inutile efforts of the Commission on Elections, PNP and the AFP to quell warlordism and stop pre and post election-related violence in the province,” he said.

Sagada folks confirm abduction
In Sagada, Mountain Province, it was confirmed that the youngsters who were held captive were on their way home from Bangaan in the town to Tubo, Abra via the provincial boundary at Buasaw mountain range when they were held by AFP elements.

As of presstime, it was learned from their host family at Bangaan that Egan Lumebyang,16, and Sumil Maguinsay,15, were reunited with their parents after relatives and the community people led by Tubo barangay Captain Suyan Malecdan claimed the children from the military soldiers.

Sumil is now attending school at Tubo National High School, Abra and not from Bangaan National High School.

Catalina Boldoken, a teacher of BNHS, an extension school of Mountain Province General Comprehensive High School said there were no students from BNHS who were held by the military in said incident.

A Bangaan resident who hosted five male minor-youngsters from Abra said Egan Lumebyang, Sumil Maguinsay, and three others left for Abra via Buasaw on June 11.

The host family said three of the male youngsters returned on the same day in Bangaan after learning that military elements were at the mountain range and took their trip via Baguio while Lumebyang and Maguinsay proceeded enroute Buasaw.

The host family who are also relatives of Maguinsay learned however that Lumebyang and Maguinsay did not reach home a week after.

The youngsters stayed in Bangaan with their relatives while they did summer job working on rice fields for at least three weeks before they left for Abra June 11.

Based from a validation report however of PO Lazaro Fangayen of Sagada police, four females, all minors, aside from Maguinsay and Lumebyang, were “intercepted” at the mountain range “by armed men believed to be soldiers” but were released. He identified them as Josie Padingil, Isabel Lawagan, Josefa Banglay, and Jane Dumallig.

The Buasaw mountain range is the shorter route to reach Abra from Sagada hiked for at least eight hours, rather than traveling the long bus way to Abra via Baguio.

Some Bangaan natives are married to residents from Tubo, thus hike the mountain range as their way to reach Abra and vice versa. The foot trail is also traversed by military soldiers on their way to Abra.

Residents said they saw a number of military the second week of June who went towards Buasaw.

Some human rights workers questioned why the youngsters were not allowed to go home as soon as possible by the military elements.

Why they were held for as long one week and their parents not even informed by the military of their stay with the soldiers at the mountain range was one of their questions.

A Bangaan resident said the soldiers might have suspected the youngsters as members of the New Peoples Army and thus held them.

Maj. Jessie Perez here of the provincial command of the PNP said the incident was under investigation.

Military version
This, as army officials based in Narvacan, Ilocos Sur had another version of the incident. They didn’t explain the alleged abduction of minors but said following the ambush, “government troopers of the Army’s 503rd Brigade overran three big camps and a cave of the New People’s Army in the mountainous areas of Tubo, Abra and at the boundary of Besao, Mountain Province and Quirino, Ilocos Sur.”

Col. Loreto G. Rirao, commander of the 503rd Brigade based in Barangay Sulvec, Narvacan, Ilocos Sur, said the capture of the camps came after a former NPA rebel disclosed their locations. .

"On June 17, 2007, our operating troops engaged the rebels in a 30-minute firefight in Tubo, Abra," he said.

“Applying combat tactics, the soldiers reportedly took vantage position in the encounter, prompting the NPA guerillas to flee,” Rirao said. “When the soldiers conducted clearing operations, they found out the NPA’s two big camps and one cave in Tubo and one camp at the boundary of Besao, and Quirino.”

The first NPA camp, he said, is located at Sitio Pananuman, Barangay Tubtuba, Tubo. This was considered the biggest of the three camps because it can accommodate at least 60 persons. There were also 25 makeshift huts, a kitchen, a mess hall, a clinic, and a social hall.

The second camp is reportedly located at Sitio Beew, Alangtin, Tubo, composed of 11 huts, a mess hall, and a clinic.

The camp can accommodate at least 40 people.

The third camp was located at the boundary of Besao and Quirino. There were at least 10 makeshift huts, a kitchen, a mess hall, and a social hall.

“The soldiers continuously conducted search-and-destroy operations in Tubo, resulting in the discovery of a cave where the NPA rebels kept their personal effects.

"Our soldiers also found two gauge-12 shotgun rifles and voluminous subversive documents in the three camps," Rirao said.

He said the camps served as training place for newly recruited rebels.

He added government troops will continue to wage their all-out operations against the rebels in the Ilocos and Cordillera.