By Teofilo P. Garcia Jr.
ZAMBOANGA CITY, Aug. 19 (PNA) -- Mayor Ma.
Isabelle Climaco-Salazar has convened the Crisis Management Committee (CMC)
while troops are tracking down the heavily-armed men who abducted a
businesswoman from a coastal barangay here Monday night.
First reports said gunmen believed to be
members of a kidnap-for-ransom-group (KFRG) seized a businessman, Noel Panes,
and his wife Michelle at around 7:26 p.m. Monday at Purok 5, Barangay Labuan,
this city.
Panes was able to escape but his wife was taken
by the suspects, who fled aboard a motorboat locally known as “Jungkung” toward
Zamboanga del Norte.
Barangay Labuan is the second to the last
barangay in this city’s west coast toward the boundary with the province of
Zamboanga del Norte.
Salazar and other city government officials,
including Zamboanga City police director Senior Supt. Angelito Casimiro,
motored to Barangy Labuan to get a first-hand information on the incident and where
the mayor convened the CMC.
The CMC met with Panes but no statement yet has
been issued by the committee.
Casimiro said the gunmen seized the Panes
couple from their business establishment and dragged and forced them to board
into one of two motorboats.
The gunmen also seized Asbi Abirin along the
way but released him upon reaching the seashore.
The Panes couple owns and manages a grocery,
which is located less than a hundred meters away from the shore of Barangay
Labuan.
“Mr. Noel Panes was able to escape when
responding elements of Police Station 10 arrived and engaged the abductors,”
Casimiro said.
The gunmen shot Panes but
missed after he fell into the water while trying to overturn one of the two
motorboats of the suspects. (PNA)
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