Mangudadatu's senior engineering staff slain in Sultan Kudarat

COTABATO CITY, Philippines – Two motorcycle-riding gunmen shot dead a senior engineering staff of Maguindanao Gov. Esmael Mangudadatu in a daring broad daylight attack in Esperanza town in Sultan Kudarat on Tuesday.

The victim, Engineer Pendi Umal Abpet, chief of the construction and technical division of the office of Maguindanao’s provincial governor, died from gunshot wounds in different parts of his body.

Senior Police Officer 1 Jose Gallano, chief investigator of the Esperanza municipal police, said Abpet was standing in front of a roadside eatery when the motorcycle-riding suspects pulled over, approached him casually as they pulled out .45 pistols from their waists and opened fire, hitting him in the head and chest.

The gunmen fled towards the direction of Ampatuan town in nearby Maguindanao.

Responding civilian volunteers and policemen rushed Abpet to a nearby hospital, where attending doctors declared him dead on arrival.

Mangudadatu, chairman of the provincial peace and order council, said he has tasked Maguindanao’s police director, Senior Superintendent Jaime Pido, to help the Esperanza municipal police investigate on the incident.

Mangudadatu said his slain subordinate was a humble, hard-working civil servant who had no known enemies.