Moro farmer killed, wife and 13-month-old child wounded in gun attack

COTABATO CITY — A Moro farmer was killed, while his wife and their 13-month-old daughter were wounded in a gun attack around midnight on Sunday, April 5, in Barangay Mileb, Radjah Buayan, in the troubled Maguindanao del Sur province.

The fatality, Said Sakilan Bansil, an ethnic Maguindanaon, died instantly from multiple gunshot wounds sustained during the attack.

Officials from the Radjah Buayan Municipal Police Station and local executives told reporters on Monday that men armed with assault rifles opened fire on the family’s house in a secluded area of Barangay Mileb before fleeing the scene.

The attack, which killed Bansil instantly, also left his wife and 13-month-old daughter wounded; both are now hospitalized.

There have been more than 10 deadly gun attacks since last year in Radjah Buayan, one of the 24 towns in the restive Maguindanao del Sur, a component province of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.

Brig. Gen. Jaysen De Guzman, director of the Police Regional Office, told reporters at noon Monday that local executives, traditional Moro datus, and officials of the Radjah Buayan municipal police are cooperating to identify the gunmen responsible for the late-Sunday attack in Barangay Mileb.

De Guzman added that criminal cases will be filed against the perpetrators once they are identified.