TACLOBAN CITY, Leyte
– The Arnulfo Ortiz Command of the New People’s Army operating in
the province of Samar, admitted to the January 25 killing of Mayor
Benito Astorga of the island municipality of Daram in the province of
Samar.
Ka Vicente Magbuhat of
the Arnulfo Ortiz Command, in a press statement said that Mayor
Astorga was sentenced by the Kangaroo court of the CPP-NPA in the area
because of crimes to humanity, the movement and the people.
He cited eleven
“crimes” purportedly committed by the late Mayor which prompted the
Movement to sentence him with the death penalty.
Foremost to Mayor
Astorga’s offenses, Ka Vicente Magbuhat alleged, was the late Mayor’s
all out support to the military, his strong focus to repel the
movement by creating the Barangay Information Network and his
maintenance of 180 CAFGU members.
Also included in the
eleven crimes allegedly committed by the late Mayor is his rejection
of the entry in his municipality of Non-government organizations and
other progressive groups, his being the brains in the killing of
CPP-NPA members in 2003 and in the killing of two other individuals,
among others.
Police reports stated
that Mayor Benito Bucatcat Astorga was shot to death while attending a
benefit dance for the village fiesta at 2:00 o’clock in the morning of
January 25 at Barangay Birawan, Daram,
Samar.
General Eliseo dela
Paz of the Philippine National Police Region 8 said that Mayor Astorga
sustained five gunshot wounds from a caliber .45 pistol. He was
brought via motorboat to Tacloban but he was pronounced dead on
arrival at the St. Paul’s Hospital in Tacloban City.
Mayor Astorga’s death
is the third in the series of killings this month in the province of
Samar.
Meanwhile, a fourth
victim, a barangay chairman of Jiabong,
Samar was shot death at
7:00 o’clock in the
evening of January 25, 2007.
