By JOSEPH ARNEL DELIVERIO
THREE armed persons were killed early Monday morning in a brief gunbattle with police operatives in R.T. Lim town in Zamboanga Sibugay province.
Joint elements of the local police and the Philippine National Police Special Armed Forces provincial office were manning a checkpoint in Barangay Poblacion at 2 a.m. when an armed group tried to force its way through and fired on the law enforcers.
Reinforcements from the PNP and the Army’s 102nd Brigade pursued the group, believed to be allied with Rogelio Gomez, a mayoral candidate in RT Lim which is 12 kilometers from the provincial capital Ipil.
Gomez is a candidate of the Lakas-Kampi party headed locally by Rep. Ann Hofer, who is eyeing the gubernatorial post in this year’s elections.
In Ipil, supporters of Vice Mayor Anamiel Olegario and his opponent, Capt. Susing Tiu, engaged in a free-for-all near a polling center in Sanito Elementary School in Barangay Sanito at 9:30 a.m. while voting was ongoing.
Roger Sardua, a member of the Civilian Volunteer Organization and a supporter of Tiu, accused Olegario’s supporters of mauling him while he was on duty at the gate of the school. He was wounded on the lips and hands.
Olegario’s camp, however, said Sardua and his CVO companions started the fight when they stoned the house of Olegario’s precinct leader Riza Oyan.
The rumble started when Sardua stopped Olegario’s young volunteers from distributing leaflets near the precinct. He was reportedly not his CVO uniform.
Relatives of the volunteers headed by Oyan and her husband arrived at the school and mauled him, reports said. The rumble ensued when other CVO members came to Sardua’s aid.
CVO members said reelectionist Vice Gov. Rey Olegario, husband of Ipil Vice Mayor Anamiel Olegario, also joined the fray and allegedly mauled another CVO member.