NPA Armed Contacts for the Second Quarter of 2012, Part I: The Resurrection of Front 4A

The NPA's Front 4A, Cesar Cayon Command, was for the last couple of years on a steady downward trajectory. Sublimated to one of Mindanao's weakest Regional Committees, the NCMRC, or Northcentral Mindanao Regional Committee, that clear decline represented a solid military victory...at least that is what the Philippine Government would have people believe. With the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP in shorthand) handing over command and control of COIN (Counterinsurgency) Operations to Provincial Governments in two Region 10 provinces- Camiguin amd Misamis Oriental- smack dab in the middle of the NCMRC AOR (as in "Area of Responsibility"), the Government propaganda was almost believable.

Then, beginning in July of 2011, the AFP's 4ID (Infantry Division) began making precision slices on Front 4A as it began to actual dissect that vulnerable Front, limb by limb. On July 6th the 58IB (Infantry Battalion) began scouring the municipality of Buenavista's Barangay Sangay, sector by sector, as it was hard on the scent of a rumored complex that was then serving as Front 4A's main camp in Agusan del Norte. Upon reaching Sitio Lower Malanay the AGP hit th motherlode; Two inter-connected camps capable of comfortably housing 250 guerillas was discovered sitting well concealed in a stretch of malarial swampland. A short but uneventful firefight led to the capture of the complex. As is so often the case however, there wasnt a guerilla within kilometers of the umuch lauded "base camp."

Then came October 6th, and with it a spectacular NPA assault on yet another province that had been handed to a provincial government by a highly self-aggrandised 4ID. The province of Surigao del Norte's municipality of Claver, home to significant foreign mining interests. Anywhere one finds foreign owned business interests carting off Mindanao's hardscrabble patrimony, "Revolutionary Taxes" and the self-serving hypoctotical pansies in the NPA who collect them are never far behind. Companies are almost always given a six month window between the tendering of unsucessful demands and the implementation of a violent "example." In this case the victim of this corporate strong arming was a Japanese multinational mining outfit, the Sumitomo Corporation.

The Claver operation was monumental from both a publicity AND a financial point of view. Given the well over a Billion Peso price tag and the media's having seized upon the NPA having temporarily abducted a large group of prospective Japanese investors, it did not take any real skill to predict that the AFP would relentlessly pursue the NPA elements involved. Never mind that it was undertaken by three other NPA Fronts- 20, 21 and 30), but it was not even witht n the NCMRC. The attack was a product of the NEMRC, or Northeast Mindana Regional Committee). Yet it was Front 4A that bore the brunt of the withering assault by both the Philippine National Police, or PNP, and an extraordinarily massive air and land assault by the AFP slash PAF, the last acronym of course being the Philippine Air Force. Pushed out of the NCMRC's AOR, Front 4A, operating in true NPA textbook fashion, hugged provincial border nexuses, to allow great ease in moving to and from, and in between provincial border convergances. While the PNP does have enteties- such as its PROs, aka Police Regional Offices, and DIPOs- or Directorates of Integrated Police Operations, the AFP is hemmed in by gradations in AOR, at best it operates within a system of concentric circles that are all adversely effected by he man/macho man infighting and turf wars that effect most any male.dominated entity. The net result og course, since the PNP,merely operates at the pleasure of the AFP vis a vis avOIN Operations, is that the NPA exploites these territorial flaws on governance.

As the post-Claver sweeps and scourings continued,
Front 4A's Secretary, or leader, a veteran of the Mindanao bush wars, Ricardo Malanili, usually known by his nom de guerre "Ka Joker," pulled his force into the AOR of the much stronger NEMRC, the Regional Commitee that covers all of Caraga and a pinch of the Davao Region. NEMRC assisted the Front on re-positioning itself in the municipality pf Esperaunza, in Agusan del Sur Province

It was in Esperanza's Barangay Calabuan, an NPA baliwick in the hills above Agusan Marsh, that Ka Joker began to feel safe. Perhaps it was this false sense of security that allowed the AFP to come calling on October 6th, 2011 without much resostance. In just a few moments, Ka Joker and four of his guerillas were dead and the rest of Front 4A, hustling through rough hewn jungle trails to pre-arranged rendevoux points, and later still met up with Fronts operating in less volatile sectors. An easy way to conceptualise the NPA modus operandi is to envision both a tactical AND a tactical shell game im which the path of least resistance is always the right path.

Though the NPA tried engaging in a bit of amateurish PSYOPs (Psychological Propaganda Operations), denying that Ka Joker had in fact never been killed and that the AFP had merely.stumbled upon an old abandoned camp previously used by Ka Joker and his Front 4A, the truth was soon undeniable as the man's grieving family members rook tgeir pain to the media, acknowledging far and wide that at least on this one occaison, the AFP and the Government it serves were telling the truth, Ricardo "Ka Joker" Malanili was gone.

As for where that fact left Front 4A, dormant best describes it. That is, until Monday, April 23rd, 2012. At 845PM two passenger vans turned into Butuan City's Arjuville Subdivision in Barangay Libretad, near the border of Barangay Bancasi.Pulling into a small row of office suites eight men jumped out of each idling van and walked purposefully towards one of five adjoining doors that serves as the main entrance of Earth Savers Security Agency. Earth Savers, a liscenced security company actually serves as a paramilitary for hire, specialising in the "security" of mining outfits throught the Caraga Region (Region 13). Owned and operated by Nelson Ponsones Nario, a recently retired PNP (Philippine National Police) Chief Superintendent.

Chief Superindendent Nario parlezed a working relationahip with embattled former President Gloria M.Arroyo into a jump into the big leagues. From serving as the Director of the Isabela PPO, or Police Provincial Office, he won a promotion in 2009 to serve as the Chief Superintendent of PRO10 (Police Regional Office 10, Cagayan del Oro City), where he served as Director of Administration. In 2010 he was laterally transferred to PRO13 in Butuan City and it was there, at the mandatory age of retirement, he cashiered out and used his many contacts to arm and build his private paramilitary.

As the sixteen men from the vans approached the entrance to Earth Savers, four other men who had stayed behind with the vans discreetly implemented a security perimeter in the parkinglot. The idling vans the slowly moved forwatd towards that same main entrance as the sixteen men, toting assault rifles but dressed in street clothes entered the agency premises. Upon infiltrating the men found four employees on duty, doing little more than goofing off. Training rifles on the four agency employees one among the sixteen men announced that they were NBI, as in National Bureau of Investigation agents, intent upon serving a search warrant for illegal weapons trafficking. Within ten minutes, without a single shot being fired, the NBI imposters had carted off sixty-six weapons, a stunning haul by any measure.

Upon getting a signal, one of the two vans carefully backed up to the door. Flinging open the vehicle's two rear doors, the guerillas cum agents began carting away all weapons found on the premises and loaded them into the van. The total take was: 46 AK47s, 10 semi-automatic shotguns, 3 308. SWSs (bolt action sniper rifles with day and night scopes)- I need to add that these three pieces were erroneously reported as M14 in sniper configuration. Ironically, yhe Pilippines is one of several nations where sniping, if one can even call it thus, takes place with semi-automatic assault rifles, in this case, M16s. To be specific, such rifles are more Designated Marksman, or at best, Squad Sniper configurations. The three pieces captured however were in fact 308. bolt action, actual sniper rifles.

Usually, AKs are less than desirable pieces for the NPA. Ironically the rifle figures prominently in NPA propaganda, even being pictured on its flag. However, the NPA gains virtually all its ammunition from war booty taken during attacks on the PNP, AFP, and allied forces. Since the Philippines is firmly in the pocket of the US, it only utilises American style weaponry, with the M16 being the central to PNP and AFP operations. The M16 is chambered in 5.56MM. The AK47 on the other hand, is in 7.65MM. It is difficult at best, to secure a steady source of AK ammunition. For the time being though, the NPA is sitting pretty. Among other things captured during that assault, the guerillas brought home 147 fully loaded AK magazines (clips). Also taken were 67 ammunition vests, for 7.65MM, shotgun shells, and other assorted ammunition. Cellphones, ICOM radios amd.cash totalling almost P15,000 ($310).


Loading the last of their take into the one van, four guerillas clambered into it as well, as the twelve others, and four on perimeter all climbed into the second van before both exited the parkinglot and casually drove away into Barangay Bonbon. It was there in Bonbon, at just after 10PM that evening, that responding PNP vehicles discovered both vans, abandoned and empty.

If Earth Savers Security Agency sounds familiar it is because I have discussed them before. On November 1st, 2011, the NPA's Front 20, the Conrado Heredia Command of the SMRC, or Southern Mindanao Regional Committee, launchrd one of its,periodic assaults against the Datu Bulawanon Mining Exploration Corporation in the municipality of Rosario, in Agusan del Sur Province. As the guerillas moved in on foot, crossing into Barangay Bayugan #3's Purok #2, they first neutralised an Earth Savers outpost a kilometer up the rode from the aforementioned mining operation. Three "guards" were critically wounded as they engaged the advancing guerillas.

Finally, when considering this latest Butuan City armed contact, remember that Barangay Bancasi housea both PRO13 AMD tge AFP's 4ID sattelite headquarters, Camp Rafael Rodriguez. The attack was anything if not audacious

NPA Armed Engagements for the Fourth Quarter of 2011, Part V: Fallout From the 5 Billion Peso Attack on Claver

Of course the AFP, or Armed Forces of the Philippines, wasn't going to sit on its inept hands after the NPA had 300 guerillas waltz into the "Pacified" province of Surigao del Norte and blow up two ships, one hundred and fourty-odd dump trucks, a couple of dozen pieces of heavy equipment, assorted barges and tugboats, blow up a mining process facility under construction, hold dozens of potential Japanese investors at gunpoint, kill five security guards, take scores of employees hostage, ambush a police convoy...did I forget anything else? Conservatively estimated at P5 Billion worth of damage just in equipment and trucks, the attack was one giant slap in the face to the AFP and its puppet, President Aquino.

Of course heads rolled but amazingly not that many. For example, with the PNP, or Philippine National Police, PNP Head Honcho, Director General Nicanor "Nick" Bartoleme removed the MPO (Municipal Police Office) Director, Senior Inspector Diomedes Cuadra, the Commanding Officer of PRO-13's, or Police Regional Office for Region 13's Public Safety Battalion (RPSB, the new moniker given to the Regional Police Mobile Group), Superintendent Rudy Cuyop and the Commanding Officer of PPO, or Police Provincial Office of Surigao del Norte Province, Senior Superintendent Emmanuel "Manny" Talento. However did not remove anyone else such as PRO-13's Director, who commands not only Cuyop and Cuadra but Talento as well! Glad to see that cronyism is alive and well but don't worry, I won't tell anyone.

Even more interestingly, within the AFP they sacked the Brigade Commander, Colonel Rodrigo Diapana and his EXO (Executive Officer, Second in Command), Colonel Cresente Q. Maligmat who concurrently commanded Task Force Stinger. Yet, the Division Commander nor any Battalion Commanders felt the heat. More to the point, no intelligence officers had their posteriors handed to them, so typical, so sad. If you are going to exercise the perogative of Command Responsibility, the protocol in Military Law that holds a commander responsible for all problems under his or her command, you must exercise that perogative universally. If you don't you merely reveal yourself for the toady fraud you are. Moreover, what about ACTUAL negligence above and beyond the principle of Command Responsibility? Declares Surigao del Norte Province "Pacified" on April 18th, 2010, a move I pointed out was far too premature and predicted would come back to haunt the previous division commander in manifest ways, yet he stays in play while you hang line officers out to dry? You ruin two Colonels' careers over a theoretical principle while ignoring ACTUAL malfeasance and culpability? AFP Chief of Staff Eduardo Oban is a sick joke. How is this for irony? On April 18th, 2010 then-commander of the 4ID (Infantry Division), Major General Mario Chan made his "Pacification" declaration at the headquarters of the 30IB (Infantry Battalion). That headquarters is in the municipality of...CLAVER.

OK, with my daily tirade out of the way...

On October 6th, 2011, at 11AM the municipality of Esperanza's Barangay Calabuan, in Agusan del Sur Province the AFP's 5th Scout Ranger Company, operating with the 58IB on backup infiltrated a small NPA camp in Sitio Simontana as its guerillas were pre-occupied with lunch. The camp belonging to Front 8 of the NEMRC, or Northeast Mindanao Regional Committee within which Front 4A of the NCMRC, or Northcentral Mindanao Regional Committe was holed up during its retreat from Claver and that huge attack on October 3rd.

Five NPA guerillas were killed, including the Secretary (the leader) of Front 4A, Ricardo Manili who is much better known by his nom de guerre, Ka Joker. Manili is also the former Secretary of the NCMRC's Operational Command, meaning he was a former commander of all military operations within the NCMRC and therefore an extremely high value target. Had the AFP instead captured him he would have been an extremely valuable font of intelligence. Of course the AFP is a military that kills kidnap victims and claims it rescued them so what are we to expect? When kidnap victims fear discovery by the AFP more than they do remaining in captivity something is terribly wrong.

In addition to kiling 5 guerillas the AFP lost a soldier who was killed in action and also managed to capture 12 assault rifles, consisting of four rare AK47s, four M14s, three M16s, and one Ultimax machine gun, a huge haul in terms of the AFP versus NPA dynamic EXCEPT that the NPA captures more than a hundred in Claver. Hey! I DID forget something, see?

NPA Armed Contacts for the Third Quarter of 2011, Part V: Open Season on Mining Companies

In terms of exploitable natural resources, no Philippine island even comes close to Mindanao. Indeed, the island holds the world's second richest gold deposit and it may in fact be deemed THE richest before all is said and done. It goes without saying then that such an abundance of natural resources goes hand in hand with some of life's most troubling aspects; organised crime, rank corruption, degradation of entire communities as greedy carpetbaggers, domestic and foreign, run roughshod over the island's lansdcape - physically as well as culturally.

With astronomical amounts of revenue at stake mining on Mindanao also attracts insurgent organisations who prey upon all involved in the dynamic. Both small scale, so called artisnal miners AND huge foreign based multi-national corporate outfits are sucked into the vortex, forced into financing bloody political struggles they barely understand and care about even less about. Representatives from the various armed groups make the rounds, collecting steep fees which are then used to fund the continuous bloodletting. While all politically organised armed groups extort in this manner, the NPA has turned its strong armed robbery into a fine art, a template used not only all over the island of Mindanao of course but throughout the Philippines as a whole. Known by a much more Politically Correct euphanism, "Revolutionary Taxes," even participants in the service economies springing up around the smallest scale artisinal operations are targetted. A habal-habal driver, as off road motorcyclists for hire who serve as the only form of public transportation in some far flung mining communities are known, are "taxed" at P500 ($11) per month, roughly 10% of gross monthly earnings. If a driver is unable to pay he must be able to offer three small bags of unmilled rice or one small bag milled. Noone is exempt and noone is overlooked.

Of course the NPA's rationale is that all "governments" tax their constituents. However, the NPA's constituents, willing or otherwise, are still bound by the Philippine Government's rules of taxation so that the NPA, to its constituency, is having them shoulder an extremely unfair burden by essentially double dipping, at least from the taxpayers' perspective. What does a taxpayer to the NPA receive in return? The payor is entitled to understand that they PROBABLY won't be troubled by the NPA for another 4 weeks. Essentially the payor is no different from a victim in a mafia extortion scheme. While it is very true that the Government provides precious little to the dirt poor peasantry composing the bulk of Mindanao's, neigh, the Philippine's overall population, does the same hold true for the multi-national corporations who are paying up to 20% of their gross revenue each month?

Multi-national corporations already pay the Government a fair share of taxes, although there are exemptions in the pre-production phase of mining agreements. Once revenue trickles in though, the Philippine Government rarely misses a centavo. This by the way is on top of the already tendered bribes that secured and expedited such agreements in the first place. Unlike the nation's vast underclass that receives practically no services for its tax burden corporations, foreign or otherwise receive the best the nation offers (granted, that isn't saying much): security, expedited bureaucratic processes in a nation where, for example, it can take literally 6 months for the post office to send a letter from Manila to Mindanao, and are provided with at least one "Fixer" to serve at said company's beck and call. Again, it really isn't saying much but at least it is a whole lot more than the average Filipino ever enjoys.

What if a corporation simply said no to paying its "Revolutionary Taxes?" Unlike the nation's poor who cannot even imagine that option, corporations doing business on Mindanao are always well armed. Those operating outside of the island's two largest population centres, Davao City in Davao del Sur Province and Cagayan del Oro City in Misamis Oriental Province, tend to organise and employ their own paramilitaries, albeit via the AFP, or Armed Forces of the Philippines SCAA programme. SCAA, or Special Citizens Active Auxiliary is a component within the AFP's CAA module. Aaaaah, the Filipino penchant for acronyms, this acronym, CAA, stands for Citizen Active Auxiliary, though most laypeople simply refer to it as CAFGU, or Citizens Auxiliary Force Geographical Unit, the CAA's most visible component. The CAA is the cornerstone of the AFP's Counterinsurgency apparatus, despite the song and dance about the touchy-feely Hearts and Minds ideation at the root of the military's OPlan Bayanihan. Bayanihan, by its simplest definition is an 80:20 Programme, with the 20% being devoted towards Tac Ops (Tactical Operations, as in "Combat") and the other 80% dedicated to a non-violent strategy rooted in community based intervention at the grass roots level. That sounds grand, doesn't it? The problem though is that EVEN IF the AFP is sincere in this shift of policy, and for the most part it isn't, you cannot unveil your new Counterinsurgency strategy at a press conference in Manila and expect linemen on Mindanao to shift gears 39 years into the game. Re-training is absolutely necessary and yet even when brigades are re-trained, as they periodically are, they aren't getting more than a single afternoon of lectures to try and re-orient them.

With that understood, the SCAAs are given very little training and absolutely none of it is of a non-tactical nature. SCAAs are not groomed to smile at children and paint the bamboo hovel serving as the village schoolhouse. They are very simply tasked with protecting their employer's business (and all too often "business interests" as well) by any means necessary. They kill and are killed and though they are obstensibly under the command structure, if not the actual command of an AFP cadre battalion, they generally are given carte blanche to do as they please. Their employer recruits them and they then become employees of a given corporation upon enlistment, ergo their loyalty isn't to the state but to that particular corporation. With between a single platoon (27 to 35 men) and a single COY, or company (100 to 120 soldiers) all armed with M4s, M14s or M16s (as opposed to the 30 caliber Garands typically distributed to CAFGU CAAs) corporations naturally begin to feel that they are immune to threats given by the NPA. What happens when corporations turn off the Peso spigot?


The Third Quarter of 2011 began with the consequences of such a decision having led to a marked reaction by the Maoists. Twenty guerillas from Front 14 (NEMRC,or Northeast Mindanao Regional Committee) in a detachment led by Renato "Ka Friday" Saysay stormed Quarry #9 in the municipality of Rosario's Barangay Bayugan #3, in Agusan del Sur Province. Their goal was oh so simple, to instruct Rosario resident Roger Sawe on the need to pay one's share of "Revolutionary Taxes." Mr.Sawe is the owne of DBEC, or Datu Bulawanon Exploration Company. This past April, 2011, DBEC entered into a rather lucrative partnership with multi-national Belvedere Asset Inc. According to Philippine Law a foreign owned corporation is limited to a 40% share in mining concessions. Known as a "60:40," a foreign owned company wishing to set out a shingle anywhere in the Philippies must first enter into a minority share partnership with a Philippine based company OR else buy into such a company as long as that buy in doesn't surpass a 40% share.

Belvedere is a shell corporation for the Mali-based TTEC, or Think Environmental Company Limited. Datu Bulawanon on the other hand already holds the rights to a 846 hectare gold operation via a Special Extraction Permit issued in November of 2009. A Philippine version of a match made in heaven.

Upon entering Quarry #9 the NPA burned one excavator and three dump trucks after divesting a caretaker of a 45 caliber pistol for good measure. Afterwards the guerillas withdrew to the Surigao del Sur Provincial border on the other side of the Diwata Mountain Range. The incident was the first NPA action in the barangay since Janurary past (2011) when Front 14 overran AY 76 Security Agency, a firm employing private guards for small scale mines and low volume goldmills. Owned by retired AFP, or Armed Forces of the Phillipines Brigadier General Alexander "Alex" Yapching, in an incident I covered in an "NPA Armed Contacts for the First Quarter of 2011" entry.


On Saturday afternoon, August 6th, 2011, the employees of Nano Mines Trading were milling about the company compound in the municipality of Impasug-ong's Barangay Kapitan Bayong, having finished with yet another long week's worth of drudgerry preparing chromite for shipping. Nano is one of two foreign-owned corporations in Impasug-ong serving as middlemen to the four chromite mining operations in that town. Bukidnon Province isn't particularly keen on foreign-owned corporations raping the environment but the two firms fill a niche that supports the aforementioned mining operations, all Lumad owned. Lumad, or Animist Hill Tribesmen, are the most marginalised of Mindanowan demographics. Bukidnon's Provincial Government sees the four chromite mines as a way in which Lumads can achieve self sufficiency. More than 500 nuclear families are supported by the 4 mines, each 20 hectares in size and adjacent to one another. Hiring mining companies, usually multi-national corporations to engage in the actual minieral extraction so that for simply allowing the mining to proceed the particular Lumad band collects 60% of the profit without investing a centavo.

Chromite is a bulk ore, with tonnage as the basic increment. In addition the ore must be processed before shipping and so there is a vital niche. Nano Mines Trading fills part of that niche, handling the output from two of the four mining operations. Centered in Barangay Bayong's Purok #5, Nano's controlling owner, Kumar Jainini, is known as a man who is serious about his business. An Indian national, Mr.Jainini spends most of his nights in the company compound despite his leasing a condominium in Cagayan del Oro City, in the adjoining province of Misamis Oriental. The afternoon of August 6th found him hard at work at his office within the compound. As Mr.Jainani sat and examined his shipping records he was distracted by screaming coming from the compound yard.

At just after 2PM 40 NPA guerillas from Front 4A (NCMRC or Northcentral Mindanao Regional Committee) quickly approached the compound on foot. Encountering a group of four company labourers just leaving the yard the employees quickly recognised that the NPA was in the midst of an assault on their workplace. The four labourers turned heel and attemped to warn their co-workers. Before any of them could do so however the NPA guerillas nearest them opened fire hitting all four:

1) Raymond Castro, 19 years old, killed immediately

2) Jose Castro, his brother, aged 21 and crtically wounded

3) Victor Aparellas, aged 23 and also critically wounded

4) The fourth man, identity not released, was also critically wounded but was quickly pulled out of the line of fire by a pair of NPA gunmen.


During the next couple of minutes seven other employees were wounded as well in varying degees. After grabbing two cell phones and a chainsaw the NPA withdrew, having failed to captured the primary owner of the company, Mr.Jainani who was able to make his way safely out of a hole in the compound wall as the initial assault took place and the commotion caught his attention. The NPA force fractured into smaller detachments who peeled off in separate directions before rendevouzing on the border of the nearby municipalities of Quezon and Kisolon. Meanwhile, some of the wounded employees were rushed to Kisolon Emergency Hospital in the nearby town of Sumilao. There both Jose Castro and Victor Aparellas were both declared Dead on Arrival. The fourth man who had been pulled out of the line of fire was found to have also have died during the attack. The rest of the wounded personnel were taken to other area hospitals without any further tragedies taking place.

Much later that same day, August 6th, PRO-10, or Police Regional Office for Region 10, via its RSOG, or Regional Special Operations Group, was able to nab prison escapee Rustic Brandia of Malaybalay City in that same province, Bukidnon, whom they accuse of being both an NPA guerilla as well as having served as a "Spotter" on that particular tactical operation. When NPA launch an assault on a static target like a CAA garrison or a mining company base camp there will be three elements:

1) Strike Force, attacks the target

2) Blocking Force, blocks any re-inforcements, as well as in some cases the withdrawal of an opposition force

3) Spotting Force, scouts certain positions both as an advance force for the Striking Force as well as to warn the Blocking Force of any movement along routes of re-inforcement

Bradia's elder brother Moises Bradia was a mid-ranking guerilla in the NPA's NCMRC, or North Central Mindanao Regional Committee. During a heated firefight in late August, 2007 Moises threw a hand grenade at a detachment of PNP, or Philippine National Police from the Malaybalay City MPO, or Municipal Police Office, killing PO2 Roy Francisco and wounding four of his fellow police officers in the process. The attack took place in the Brandia family home in Malaybalay City's Barangay #9, Purok #5 when five MPO officers came to serve a warrant for Rape, having had no idea that Moises Brandia was a moderately high ranking guerilla. Mid-Level and High Level NPA members always carry a hand grenade when out of the bush to be used in such situations. Brandia was then able to escape though he had also critically wounded his own mother inadvertantly in the blast. In the end she recovered.


It is worth noting that August 6th, 2011 was also the day upon which the Mayor of Lingig, Henry Santos Dano was captured by the NPA Front 20 (Conrado Heredia Command, SMRC, or Southern Mindanao Regional Committee) along with his two military bodyguards from the 75IB (Infantry Battalion). All three remain in captivity as of this posting, August 28th, 2011.