Sara Duterte Offers P2 Million Reward For Davao Bombing Suspects

On Monday, September 5,2016 Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio  willingly offered a P2-million reward for the immediate arrest of the fugitives who were behind the Friday night bombing in the city.

In an interview with ABS-CBN's "Umagang kay Ganda," Duterte-Carpio said she has set aside P1 million for information about the suspects and another P1 million for anyone who can "deliver" them to the city government.

The police said that they were searching for three people wanted for questioning over the bombing of a night market. The blast, which happened in a busy market in Davao city on Friday, killed at least 14 people and led the President to impose a "state of lawlessness" in the country.

The head of Davao police on Sunday described that a man was seen leaving a bag with an improvised bomb at the market while being followed by other two women.

Police are still finding the three -- and possibly a fourth person -- over the bombing, which has been extensively blamed on the Muslim extremist Abu Sayyaf group.

Senior Superintendent Michael John Dubria even informed reporters that the man went for a massage in the market and left the bag in that bomb area. They think and believe that the offhand explosive device exploded when the person left, and that the two women had been following the man. Another individual may have activated the device with a cellphone, he said.

He would not confirm exactly who was behind the blast but said the bomb, using a mortar shell, was the same to those used by terrorist groups in central Mindanao.

There are several Muslim outlaw groups in that area, including separatist guerrillas but the Abu Sayyaf militants are based somewhere else, mainly in the provinces of Sulu and Basilan.

Davao is the hometown of President Duterte, who had just ordered an offensive against the Abu Sayyaf prior to the bombing. Duterte said the explosion was in retribution for the military operation against the group in their strongholds in Jolo, Sulu.However, Chief Inspector Andrea de la Cerna, spokeswoman of a task force investigating the explosion, said they were not ruling out other motives for the attack.

After the bombing, Duterte has decided to declare a national "state of lawlessness," which his security adviser said gave the military extra powers to conduct law enforcement operations which is ordinarily done only by the police.

The military is continuing to press an offensive against the Abu Sayyaf in Jolo following a clash on August 29 that left 15 soldiers dead. However, military spokesman Brigadier General Restituto Padilla said the Abu Sayyaf has since been staying away from any discussion of such.

Source: ABS-CBN