Raid in Sultan Kudarat town yields guns, shabu

GENERAL SANTOS CITY, Philippines -- A combined team of police and Marine personnel arrested three wanted men and seized from them drugs, an M60 machinegun and pistols in an operation in Kalamansig, Sultan Kudarat on Wednesday.

 

The suspects -- Akas Kasan, 56, Mantingan Silongan, 43, and Mohariden Silongan, 18 -- were cornered in their hideout in the seaside Barangay Nililadan in Kalamansig by a raiding team comprised of members of the police’s elite Special Action Force and the 7th Marine Battalion.

 

Supt. Romeo Galgo, Jr., a senior official of the Police Regional Office 12 in General Santos City, said the operation was carried out based on a warrant of arrest for issued by local court over murder charges.

 

Galgo said that aside from the crew-operated M-60 machinegun, pistols and ammunition, police also seized 18 sachets of methamphetamine hydrochloride (shabu) ready for distribution in Barangay Nililidan.

 

Local officials said the suspects are scions of an influential noble Moro clan in Kalamansig.

 

“They are hitmen of an influential datu in the municipality,” said one of the sources, who requested anonymity for fear of reprisals.

 

Among the targets of the police and Marines who served the warrant for the arrest of the suspects is their leader, Tinti Mangatin, a commander of a rogue guerrilla group identified with certain Moro politicians.

 

He managed to escape, bringing with him assault rifles and a blue bag that witnesses believe was filled with shabu.

 

Galgo said guns and drugs confiscated from the suspects will be used as evidence in filing new criminal cases against them.