Cargo vehicle driver killed in grenade, gun attack in Cotabato

COTABATO CITY — A Moro driver of a multicab loaded with fruits died instantly from gunshot and grenade shrapnel wounds sustained in an attack in Barangay Takepan in Pikit town, Cotabato province, on Saturday afternoon, April 18.

Local executives, officials of the Pikit Municipal Police Station, and units of the Police Regional Office–Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in the Bangsamoro Special Geographic Area separately said on Sunday, April 19, that the target of the ambush, Nano Guiambalanan Salimenang, was declared dead on arrival at a hospital where emergency responders brought him for treatment.

Barangay officials in Takepan and responding police officers said the 60-year-old Salimenang was on his way to deliver the cargo of the green multicab he was driving when he was shot by men riding motorcycles behind him.

One of the attackers then hurled a fragmentation grenade that exploded where he alighted as he tried to escape.

The assailants fled immediately using motorcycles.

Radio reports in Central Mindanao on Sunday said that municipal officials in Pikit, one of the 17 towns in Cotabato province, are helping police investigators identify the perpetrators of the attack for possible prosecution.