From the Business Mirror (Feb 26): Military bucks planned release of MILF commander
THE military is up in arms over the planned release of a ranking commander of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) who was arrested at checkpoint of a joint team of policemen and soldiers in Cotabato City on Sunday.
Some junior officers said the law should not be bended in the case of Wahid Tundok, commander of the MILF’s 118th Base Command, who is facing more than a hundred of criminal cases, including the killing of 10 soldiers in 2009.
A statement from the Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process (Opapp) said on Wednesday that “preparations are underway for the formal release of Tundok, following the recall of the warrant of arrest order by Branch 15 of the Regional Trial Court in Cotabato City on Tuesday.”
“The turnover by the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group of the National Police to the MILF-Coordinating Committee on the Cessation of Hostilities [CCCH] will take place tomorrow [Thursday] in the presence of the International Monitoring Team, the Government-CCCH, the Ad-hoc Joint Action Group and several local government officials,” the statement added.
Military officers criticized the Opapp for facilitating the release of Tundok under the government’s peace agreement with the MILF, despite knowing that he is facing more than a hundred cases, including multiple murder.
An official report released in 2008 by the National Police said Tundok was among the leaders and members of the MILF who attacked several towns in Central Mindanao after the Supreme Court rejected the memorandum of agreement on the Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD) that the government signed with the rebel group in 2008.
The National Police said it had filed a total of at least 110 criminal cases against leaders and members of the MILF that included Ameril Umbra Kato and Tundok over the attack.
Specifically, Tundok is facing 31 counts of murder and 30 counts of robbery that were filed in connection with the pillage and burning if the towns of Pigcawayan, Alamada, Libungan, Midsayap, Aleosan and Pikit in North Cotabato during the attack.
Civilian-populated areas in North Cotabato, Maguindanao, Lanao del Sur and Lanao del Norte were attacked by the MILF under Kato, Tundok and other leaders of the group inn retaliation over the rejection of the MOA-AD.
Aside from Kato and Tundok, also named in the charges that were filed by the Central Mindanao police commander under then Chief Supt. Felicisimo Khu Jr. were Mustapha Gundalanga alias Comander Tha and Commanders Abdul Bayan, Jack Abas, Mohammad, Bravo, Ismael Manalasal and Haun Sinadato.
They were accused of “taking 26 barangays in five municipalities in North Cotabato” beginning on July 1, 2008.
“The complaints may not be enough but for sure this will make Kato and his men pay for what they did to the civilians in North Cotabato,” Khu said.
Aside from the attack and burning of villages and the killing of civilians, the police said Tundok also led the attack on the detachment of the Army’s 71st Infantry Battalion in Mamasapano, Maguindanao, on January 7, 2005, where 10 soldiers were killed and another soldier went missing.
“The attackers also took 10 long firearms and one caliber .50 machine gun,” the police said.
Tundok was reportedly among the contacts of the Jemaah Islamiyah and the international terror group al-Qaeda in the country.