The Armed Forces of the Philippines on Thursday said most of the Sagay City massacre victims were not land beneficiaries and were not even residents of Negros Occidental.
AFP Chief of Staff Gen. Carlito Galvez Jr. said the military had recovered documents linking the victims as new recruits of the Communist Party of the Philippine-National People’s Army.
“We gathered eight of the victims were new recruits… The recruits possibly were not beneficiaries. Most of them were not from there, some were tricycle drivers, some lived in nearby municipalities,” Galvez told a Palace press briefing.
READ: AFP chief ties Sagay massacre to Red plan to incite outrage
According to the AFP chief, the NPA negotiated with the victims two days prior to the attack, promising them land areas in exchange for P500, saying it was part of the Left’s plot to oust President Rodrigo Duterte.
Asked what was the motive of the NPA in having a hand in the killings, Galvez said the communist rebels wanted to put the Duterte administration in bad light.
“The CPP has been hatching plans to oust the Duterte administration and this incident is part of their plan to rouse civil unrest and discredit the government,” he said.
Meanwhile, the President warned the communists he was determined to mobilize government forces to stop them from sowing terror and violence in communities outside the metropolis.
Galvez said the recovered documents in an encounter with NPA rebels in Sorsogon revealed the communists’ “sinister plot” to occupy private and public lands, creating tense situations which would result in violence.
“From the documents we got, we saw this Oplan Okupasyon and Oplan Bungkalan. This is what we call forcible occupation of private and public lands, this is like what the Kadamay did,” he told Palace reporters.
“They will create situations to manipulate and arouse people,” he added, claiming CPP founding chairman Jose Ma. Sison gave the order.
According to him, the military and police authorities were closely looking into the three leads.
“We have three leads. Maybe one of the landowners or claimants [did the attack], second is maybe the land owner’s private armed group, and the third is an indication that there is the hand of the CPP-NPA because there was one warning shot or agitation shot,” Galvez said, explaining that the same incident happened in Mendiola and Hacienda Luisita attacks.
“A shot came from the ranks of the protesters. Then that’s when the shooting began,” he said.
On Saturday, nine farmers were killed when they were shot at while resting in their tents at the Hacienda Nene in Barangay Bulanon in Sagay City.
Both the AFP and PNP believed the victims were members of the National Federation of Sugar Workers, a suspected front of the CPP-NPA.
The President on Tuesday skipped his scheduled visit to the wake of the nine sugarcane farmers murdered in Sagay, Negros Occidental because of inclement weather.
Galvez, meanwhile, said he would meet with Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea to report on the Sagay massacre and other security concerns.
READ: NPA blamed for massacre of 9 farmers