6-member drug dealing gang surrender in Radjah Buayan

MAGUINDANAO --- Six drug dealers pledged to reform for good over the Qur’an Monday, three days after authorities shot dead two heavily-armed bandits distributing shabu in a nearby town.

The six men surrendered through the efforts of the multi-sector municipal peace and order council in Rajah Buayan town in the second district of Maguindanao.

The group, led by Willy Akil, turned in assorted firearms, including a 5.56 caliber Ultimax assault rifle during a surrender rite in the town proper of Rajah Buayan jointly presided over by Mayor Yacob Ampatuan, officials of the Army’s 33^rd Infantry Battalion and 601^st Brigade, and Maguindanao’s police director, Col. Arnold Santiago.

 “They promised over the Holy Qur’an to turn away from their shabu distribution activities,” Ampatuan said.

The group distributed shabu in interior barangays in Maguindanao’s Rajah Buayan and Sultan sa Barongis towns and in Lambayong, Sultan Kudarat.

Ampatuan said credit for the surrender of the six men has to go partly to his constituent-barangay captains, to the 33^rd IB, the 603^rd Brigade, the police director of Maguindanao and leaders of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front based in Rajah Buayan.

“They helped our LGU workout the surrender of these men. Our focus now is to reintroduce them to mainstream society,” Ampatuan said.

Akil and his men surrendered exactly three days after combined personnel of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency-Bangsamoro Region, the 40^th IB and the Maguindanao provincial police killed bandits Sindatuk Pendaliday and Nurhamin Pendaliday in a brief gunfight in Barangay Malala in Datu Paglas, Maguindanao.

The duo worked as couriers of shabu for long wanted drug trafficker Abdullah Pendaliday, leader of a heavily-armed gang implicated in armed robbery, multiple murder and propagation of marijuana.

Pendaliday, also known as “Grass Cutter,” thrice eluded in the past three years joint entrapment operations by the police and units of the 601^st Brigade.

“These six drug dealers who surrendered to us felt that their world is shrinking fast due to the government’s unrelenting campaign against illegal drugs. They decided to surrender and reform for good,” Ampatuan said.