Police still clueless on Bukidnon bus bombing

NORTH COTABATO – Police and Army probers are still facing a blank wall on Tuesday afternoon’s bus bombing in Maramag town in Bukidnon that left 11 passengers dead and injured 20 others.Nine of the 20 fatalities died on the spot according to senior members of the municipal peace and order council of Maramag, located at the border of the adjoining Bukidnon and North Cotabato provinces.The provincial office of the state-run Philippine Information Agency in Bukidnon had quoted Lt. Col. Lynart Castisimo, commanding officer of the Army’s 23 Infantry Battalion, as having said that the improvised explosive device used in the attack was left underneath a vacant seat in the center of the bus.The ill-fated bus, bearing body number 2640, is owned by the Rural Transit Mindanao, Inc. (RTMI), which serves the Tacurong City-North Cotabato-Bukidnon-Cagayan de Oro route.It was the second unit of the same transportation firm suspected extortionist had bombed in just four weeks.Four passengers were slightly injured in the November 6 explosion that ripped through RTMI's bus number 204 while in Maramag, en route to Cagayan de Oro City from Sultan Kudarat province in Central Mindanao.Most of the passengers injured in Tuesday’s bus bombing near the vicinity of the government-owned Central Mindanao University, located along a stretch of the Sayre Highway in Maramag, were students of the school who were on their way home to nearby towns.Highly-placed sources from the military and the provincial police offices in Bukidnon and North Cotabato said there were indications that an extortion gang could be responsible for the bombing.The RTMI management, however, denied having received any extortion demand from any group prior to the incident.The transportation company promised to help pay for the medical bills of the passengers injured in Tuesday’s bombing of one of its buses.Major Gen. Edmundo Pangilinan, commander of the Army’s 6thInfantry Division, which has jurisdiction over Central Mindanao’s adjoining North Cotabato and Maguindanao provinces and Tacurong City, on Wednesday ordered military units under his command to help secure RTMI buses if inside the 6thID’s territory.Captain Joan Petinglay, spokesperson of 6thID, said Pangilinan had also mobilized intelligence operatives to help gather information needed to hasten the investigation on the incident by the Bukidnon provincial police and the Army’s 4thInfantry Division, whose territory covers all towns in Bukidnon province. That’s the most the 6thID can do to help in the investigation by the police because the incident happened outside of its area of responsibility,” Petinglay said.