Truck driver, 7 villagers die in Cotabato highway mishap

COTABATO CITY — A driver and seven others died when his wayward ten-wheeler truck rammed vehicles and houses along a highway in Barangay Malasila in Makilala, Cotabato on Thursday morning, December 5. 

In initial statements an hour after the incident, Lt. Col. Rolly Oranza, acting chief of the Makilala Municipal Police Station, and officials of the Cotabato Provincial Police Office said that truck driver Leopoldo Gantes Ibañez lost control of the wheel due to mechanical trouble while maneuvering through a downhill stretch of the highway, causing the deadly accident.

Ibanez and seven others, including Joey Pamplona, his wife Tina, and their young son, a kindergarten pupil, perished in the accident, according to police investigators and personnel from the Cotabato Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office (PDRRMO), who responded to the scene.

The light truck, four-wheeled vehicles, motorcycles and houses hit by the large truck driven by Ibañez, loaded with commercial fertilizers, were badly damaged.

The office of Cotabato Gov. Emmylou Taliño-Mendoza immediately dispatched employees of their PDRRMO to extend initial assistance to the families of the accident fatalities.

Mendoza has urged police officials in the province to compel the owner of the 10-wheeler truck to compensate the families of the accident fatalities.