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Pangasinan vice-mayor is 56th slain Bayan Muna member

MAPANDAN, Pangasinan (July 8) — Mapandan Vice Mayor Adolfo Aquino was shot dead on July 6 shortly after presiding the Municipal Council session and talking to some townmates at about 6:35 p.m. Police reports said 7 bullet wounds killed Aquino by an unidentified assailant. His driver died too while undergoing a surgery in a hospital in Dagupan City after sustaining a gunshot wound in the chest.

Bayan Muna Provincial Coordinator Michael Morden said Aquino was the latest and the 56th in the roster of slain Bayan Muna members this year.

“The crime scene is about 30 meters from the police station. A single gun shot should have alerted the police but it took 10 minutes for the policemen on duty to respond,” said Eden Aquino, the victim’s wife.

Eden waited for the remains of her husband to arrive on July 7, where Aquino was supposed to attend a family reunion in Los Angeles.

“The authorities were quick to give sanctions but the local police were initially slow in their pursuit of the lone gunman when told by witnesses,” adding, that her brother-in-law and her husband’s supporters were the ones who immediately ran after the assailant.

Supt. Egar Basbas, provincial deputy director and chair of the newly formed Task Force Aquino clarified that any development would not be disclosed so as not to spoil the ongoing investigation. The entire police force was sacked including its chief, Insp. Reynaldo Tamondong upon order of PNP Director General Arturo Lomibao.

“His death is the death of democracy in Mapandan. His installation had put a light to a democratic rein in the town which has long been ruled by a powerful political clan,” Morden said.

He sought the help of the partylist in the elections following a constraint with the ruling party. He actively campaigned for the partylist,” he added.

An initial report in the partylist’s independent fact finding mission revealed that nights before the incident, an unidentified man asked townsfolk about the exits of the cemetery where the assailant ran and rode a motorcycle driven by a companion for escape.

Eden believes that the killling was purely political. “You ask the townspeople and they know who killed my husband,” she hurled a challenge to a group of media men early morning on Thursday.

She said she hesitated to allow Aquino to runin the last elections due to financial constraint. “But the people wanted him to, even doing dole out to provide for food, materials and manpower just to sustain his campaign,” she said.

She said Aquino was the only candidate who had a rival in the elections and that their camp was accused of plotting a an assasination attempt to then running mayor Ferdinand Calimlim.

“Our townmates are vocal. This early, they were clamoring for him to run as mayor in the next election,” she said. # Jhong dela Cruz for NORDIS

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