Troops foil attack in Maguindanao

MAGUINDANAO, Philippines - The soldiers who clashed on Sunday in Mamasapano town with a group reportedly led by an Indonesian have unknowingly foiled a plot to hoist there the Islamic State flag for propaganda purpose.

The two factions in the outlawed Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters both denied involvement in the hostilities, insinuating that a third group perpetrated the attack before dawn Sunday on a detachment of the Army’s 40th Infantry Battalion (IB) in Tukanalipao, Mamasapano.

Three members of different municipal peace and order councils in the second district of Maguindanao on Tuesday said authorities must investigate deeper on the incident, convinced that a mysterious gang linked to the Maute and Abu Sayyaf, now grouped as the Dawlah Islamiya, was behind the atrocity.

“Their plan was to take over the detachment manned by a platoon of soldiers belonging to the 40th IB and plant their flag there, to be captured on video that would be used for a propaganda hype amid the crisis in Marawi City,” said a community elder, an acknowledged Moro datu, who requested anonymity.

A mayor said on Tuesday that he learned from his constituents that the plot of the militants was to use Facebook in creating an impression that there is presence of Dawlah Islamiya forces in Maguindanao too.

“That is something local executives in Maguindanao will never allow to happen. Local officials and their followers will do everything to stop that,” the mayor said.

Captain Arvin Encinas, public affairs officer of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division (ID), said three gunmen were killed in the bungled attempt to take over the detachment.

Barangay residents identified the fatalities as Samir Bantuas, Bona Samsudin and Guiapar Angkay, who were carried away by companions as they fled in haste.

Local residents said a gunman named Tantung, who was wounded in the encounter, died the next day.

Cpl. Samsudin Mohammad, the lone Army fatality in the encounter, was hit by bullets while advancing towards enemies firing his M-16 rifle, loudly chanting Allahu Akbar.

“For us he is a martyr who fought extremists pretending to be Muslims,” said the moderate Sunni Muslim Lt. Col. Markton Abo, civil military relations officer of 6th ID.

Abo said Mohammad and his companions have prepared for the attack, warned by Muslim villagers observing the month-long Ramadan fasting season.

Muslims fast from dawn to dusk, as a spiritual obligation and atonement for wrongdoings, during the Ramadan, a holy month in Islam where warfare is prohibited.

Barangay Tukanalipao is one of the scenes of the deadly encounters on Jan. 25, 2015 between personnel of the police’s elite Special Action Force and Moro guerillas that was become known as the “Mamasapano incident.”

The SAF men were retreating from nearby Barangay Pidsandawan, where they have killed in a raid Malaysian terrorist Zulkifl bin Hir, most known as Marwan, when they were attacked from different directions by guerrillas of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and members of the BIFF.

The running gunfights, which lasted for 11 hours, resulted in the deaths of 44 SAF personnel, 17 MILF guerrillas and five villagers.

“Imagine the media mileage the militants who planned to raise the ISIS flag inside the detachment of the 40th IB would have gained had they succeeded in their diabolic plot. It would have been immense knowing the contemporary historical value of Mamasapano,” said a moderate Imam, who had studied Islamic theology abroad.