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Humiliated AFP Unleashes Its Force vs Civilians in Compostela Valley
Smarting
from a humiliating encounter with the NPA, the military in Southern Mindanao
unleashed its terrifying might on the villagers of New Bataan town, in
Compostela Valley. What happened next was a nightmare to the civilians.
By
Daisy C. Gonzales
Bulatlat.com
Mindanao Bureau
 DAVAO
CITY — “Traydor kaayo! (They were treacherous!)” was how Fe Ybańez,
a 29-year-old farmer from a hinterland village of New Bataan town, Compostela
Valley province, described the killers of her husband Hever. On July 1,
Hever’s body was found in a shallow grave. His corpse bore signs of what could
only be torture.
According
to those who have seen and examined the body, Hever’s skull was soft and
tender; this was apparently crushed. A bullet pierced his right cheek. His
shoulders were broken. His right arm and leg were nearly severed. Bullet wounds,
almost perfectly aligned, were on his right arm.
Fe Ybanez, wife of murdered villager Hever Ybanez, wants to go back to her home
and farm. That can only happen, she said, if the military pulls out.
Photo
by Daisy C. Gonzales
Hever
had been one of the leaders of sitio Cabungcogan. He was the first civilian
casualty since the military, still smarting from an embarrassing defeat in the
hands of the New People’s Army (NPA) in the same village last June 30 (in
which 13 soldiers and paramilitary men were killed), descended upon the
hinterland villages of New Bataan with such ferocity residents were terrified
enough to evacuate to safer areas.
Fe’s
village, Cabungcogan, and four other villages of barangay Pagsabangan are now
heavily militarized by the combined forces of the 701st Infantry
Brigade and the elite Scout Rangers. Vicente Sidon, a councilor of Pagsabangan,
said “We are afraid that what happened to Fe’s husband will also happen to
us.”
Hundreds
of soldiers are scouring the area for the Communist guerrillas. A food blockade
has been in place, according to residents. Civilians are threatened, some of
them manhandled by soldiers. The military installed a cannon inside an
elementary school in New Bataan, aimed toward the villages.
Most
of the civilians in these five villages have evacuated. Hundreds left on July 5
and are now cramped in two rooms of the elementary school in New Bataan town.
Some have moved to their relatives in other areas.
The
farmers are worried about their farms and livestock. They have asked the
military to pull out of their villages so they can go home. “We cannot harvest
our rice and corn. That’s why we ask the military to pull out and allow us to
return,” Jaime Elias, 48, a farmer from sitio Hagutayan, also in barangay
Pagsabangan, told Bulatlat.com.
Humiliating
Encounter
On
June 30, shortly before noon, a platoon of soldiers from the 60th IB
encountered a group of NPA guerrillas in sitio Cabungcogan. A fierce, one-hour
firefight resulted in the deaths if 13 soldiers and militiamen, among them Lt.
Peter James Angeles, the intelligence chief of the 60th IB and a
graduate of Philippine Military Academy. The
NPA, in a statement released a day later, said that they had no casualty; the
military claimed that it killed at least one guerrilla.
By
all accounts, it was a humiliating debacle for the military, coming as it did
only a few days after the military also suffered another setback during an NPA
raid in Samar, in the Visayas. The NPA, in a statement a day after the
encounter, said that the soldiers had gotten wind of their presence in the area
and were, in fact, preparing for an ambush. Yet according to the guerrillas,
their mastery of the terrain allowed them the opportunity to turn the situation
to their advantage.
That
same day, at around 9 a.m., Fe said Hever went out to the cooperative store in
another village to buy rice. She said that she later heard gunfire; her hut was
about two kilometers away from where the encounter took place. While the NPA
claimed that the firefight lasted only an hour, Fe said she heard gunfire as
late as 4 p.m. By sunset, Hever was still not home and Fe started to worry.
Worried
Sick
But
she was also afraid that their village might not be safe. So she packed up a few
clothes for her two-year-old Princess, took her two other children and a carabao
and went to Pagsabangan to spend the night there. She worried all throughout the
night about Hever.
The
next day, the Pagsabangan villagers found troops already milling around the
basketball court. Vicente Sidon, a village councilor, told Bulatlat.com
that the soldiers had started searching houses for NPA guerrillas. The soldiers
were hoping, he said, to find the weapons the NPA had recovered from the
soldiers who died the day before. (The NPA said they carted away 12 high-powered
rifles.)
That
same day, Capt. Jonathan Gayas of
the 60th IB went to the encounter site in Cabungcogan. When he came
down to Pagsabangan with12 other soldiers later in the day, they were
accompanied by 10 civilians whom they used as guides.
Fe
was with a crowd of residents at the basketball when one soldier boasted: “We
killed a civilian.” Her heart jumped. She looked at the soldier to check his
nameplate – there was none. Fe was alarmed but she kept calm.
That
afternoon, Fe and her neighbors decided to go home to Cabungcogan after they
were given permission by the military. Fe stayed in the village before
Cabungcogan, where she had left her carabao, while her neighbors, among them
Jaime Elias, went straight to Cabungcogan. Along the way, they found Hever’s
cap and slippers by the roadside. Beside these was a spot on the ground that
looked like loosened soil. It was Hever’s grave.
Food
Blockade, Mauling
As
the military operations in the hinterland villages of New Bataan heightened
since the June 30 encounter, cases of human-rights violations -- such as the
imposition of food blockade and physical assaults on civilians – have been
reported. Some of the initial reports were made by the Kilusang Magbubukid ng
Pilipinas based in New Bataan.
As
of July 6, three residents of barangay Cahayag reported during a barangay
session that they were victims of the food blockade. Many of the villagers pass through barangay Bantacan, where
an Army detachment has been installed, in going to Cahayag. According to the
residents, soldiers at the detachment confiscated their food provisions such as
milled rice. Villagers were only allowed five kilos of rice every family.
Gani
Samonte, a resident of barangay Pagsabangan and a chainsaw operator, made the
mistake of starting his chainsaw one morning that same week. According to Romulo
Luis, a former village official, Samonte usually started his day by testing his
chainsaw. That morning, he was supposed to cut logs for the village’s daycare
center. But when soldiers heard the sound of the chainsaw, they accosted Samonte.
“Are you sending a message to the NPA?!” the soldiers wanted to know.
Samonte
was dragged to the village’s multi-purpose center, where he was mauled by the
soldiers. The residents could only watch. The soldiers stopped beating Samonte
only when Romeo Agustin, a barangay councilor, pleaded with them to stop.
Residents
interviewed by Bulatlat.com said that more military reinforcements have
been seen in the villages of Valma in Compostela and Sarmento, Cabinuangan,
Cahayag, all of New Bataan.
The
military has denied that human-rights violations took place in New Bataan.
According to Col. Rodolfo Obaniana, commander of the 701st Infantry
Brigade, there was no food blockade in place in those villages. “There’s no
such thing as food blockade. What we are doing is checking the food that’s
entering the area because we heard reports that the food are for the rebels.
These are all the propaganda of the enemy,” Obaniana told reporters in Davao
City.
Fe
told Bulatlat.com that she and her fellow villagers want nothing more now
than justice. “We are poor. We are not armed. We are just farmers. Why are the
soldiers taking it out against us?” she said in Visayan.
Jaime
Elias said they want to go back to their farms and homes. “We have to take
care of our crops. We plead to the military to pull out their soldiers because
as long as they are there, we cannot eat. We have children to feed and to send
to school,” he said. Bulatlat.com
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