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Cotabato City Council bet dead in ambush

N E W S B R I E F S

02/09/2010

Gunmen yesterday killed a candidate for a seat in the city council of Cotabato in an ambush that was suspected to be linked to his candidacy, police said.

According to local policeman, Senior Insp. Wally Kasuyo, Joseph Kwan Datuwata, 42, was ambushed as he and his two young children were leaving their home in Cotabato City in a pick-up truck.

Kasuyo said Datuwata, a local businessman who was running for a seat in the city council in the synchronized national and local elections in May, briefly pursued his attackers and exchanged gunfire with them, before dying.

Cotabato is in Maguindanao province and just 20 kilometers from the site of the horrifying massacre in November last year that saw gunmen allegedly loyal to another local politician shoot dead 57 persons.

All of Maguindanao remains under a state of emergency following the massacre, with extra government security forces deployed there in an effort to prevent any more violence.

Kasuyo, though, said police are not capable of stopping all incidents ahead of the elections.

“The police cannot be everywhere,” Kasuyo said.

Across the Philippines, elections are always marred by violence with politicians infamous for using gunmen to eliminate rivals and intimidate voters.

According to national police statistics, at least 121 persons were killed in the lead up to the 2007 congressional elections, slightly lower than the 148 who died in the 2004 national elections.

Including Monday’s death, at least 63 persons have so far been murdered in politically related violence ahead of the forthcoming elections.

Datuwata planned to run under the slate of independent mayoral candidate Zeny Dilangalen, whose family has ties to President Arroyo’s ruling coalition.

The Dilangalens are also related by marriage to the two rival Muslim clans involved in the Nov. 23 massacre – the Ampatuans and the Mangudadatus.

AFP

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