Negros Town Mayor, 3 Police Chiefs Not in NPA Hit List

Communist Party of the Philippines leaders in Negros have denied the existence of a supposed hit list which mentions the names of the Pontevedra town mayor and three police chiefs. They accused military authorities of concocting the hit list.

By Edgar A.Cadagat and Karl G. Ombion 
Bulatlat.com / Cobra-ans

BACOLOD CITY -- Pontevedra Mayor Jose Benito Alonzo and three police chiefs may now sleep soundly after the Communist Party of the Philippines’ Negros Island Regional Party Committee revealed over the weekend that the four were not on the revolutionary underground’s hit list.

The CPP-Negros statement which was circulated in the provincial press here virtually quashed speculations aired on radio broadcasts on May 14 about the alleged hit list in Negros.

In the alleged hit list, aside from Alonzo, were Supt. Edgardo Esperagoza, police chief of La Carlota City; Chief Insp. Melchor Coronel, Jr., police chief of Valladolid; and Insp. Argel Ancheta, police chief of Pontevedra.

The typewritten statement bearing the CPP-New People’s Army Negros Island logo was signed by Diego Dagohoy of the executive committee of the CPP in the region and Bayani Obrero, NPA spokesperson.

Dagohoy and Obrero warned the four however against committing anti-people crimes for which they would incur blood debts.

The two underground leaders also said that the alleged hit list on the four officials was no doubt concocted by the Negros military in order to force them (hit list targets) to seek military protection. The military concoction, they said, was also intended to demonize the NPA by making it appear it was targetting people indiscriminately and without any basis at all.

“Only those who have incurred blood debts against the people, have committed grave harm against the masses and the revolutionary movement and who have not rectified crimes committed in spite of the chances given them, will be meted the maximum penalty of death,” the statement declared. “It is the people’s court which decides on this matter and it will not mete out the death penalty unless and until there is a strong basis against those accused.”

As for the three police chiefs and the Pontevedra mayor, there is no sufficiect basis to punish them with the supreme penalty of death, the statement said.

Even those the armed revolutionary movement considered as reactionary elements are not automatically the enemies, the statement said. But, it said, there are those who are considered as despotic and they belong to the Macapagal-Arroyo regime whom the CPP considers its enemies. Bulatlat.com

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