Situation getting alarming: VG

From the Visayan Daily Star (Dec 21): Situation getting alarming: VG

The series of killings in Negros and Bacolod City are getting alarming, Vice Governor Eugenio Jose Lacson said yesterday, as he called on authorities to get their acts together in preventing the occurrence of such crimes.

Lacson, who cited the killing of a barangay captain and the ambush of Bacolod Councilor Ricardo “Cano” Tan and his wife in a matter of weeks, as well as the murder of a deputy police chief in Negros Oriental, said “We cannot say anymore that this is an isolated case”.

In the past two months, human rights lawyer Benjamin Ramos was murdered in Kabankalan City, while the police have yet to identify an armed group behind the massacre of nine persons occupying a private property in Sagay City, all in Negros Occidental.

Lacson said authorities must step up and find ways and means on how to control such incidents.

Col. Benedict Arevalo, 303rd Infantry Brigade commander, yesterday said that many killings in Negros Occidental have been attributed to the New People’s Army, as they have recorded 26 murder incidents perpetrated by communist rebels since January up to this time.

Arevalo said what they are focusing on how to address the NPA-perpetrated killings.

The National Bureau of Investigation is focusing on the business rivalry angle in the ambush of Bacolod City Councilor Tan and his wife, as its probers raised the possibility that the suspects were hired gunmen.

Lacson, who condemned the series of killings, said there is no reason to kill anybody, unless it is self-defense.

The police in Bacolod City have yet to establish a breakthrough in their investigations in the murder of lawyer Rafael Atotubo and barangay captain Nelson Ligaya, who were both also killed by riding-in-tandem suspects.

http://www.visayandailystar.com/2018/December/21/topstory2.htm