BOMBED. The ill-fated police patrol car driven by slain Police Officer 1 Christopher Anadon after the NPA roadside bombing and ambush in Magpet, North Cotabato on Monday (Jan. 28). (Photo courtesy of North Cotabato PPO)
KIDAPAWAN CITY – A police officer slain on Monday in a North Cotabato roadside bombing by communist rebels was set to marry his girlfriend next month.
The girlfriend of PO1 Christopher Anadon, 28, told reporters she and the slain policeman were engaged and set to get married in February this year.
She asked not to be named but added she was three months pregnant.
She briefly spoke to media at a funeral parlor here, saying she was grief-stricken that “the marriage will no longer take place.”
Senior Supt. Maximo Layugan, North Cotabato police director, said Anadon was with about 20 other police officers heading for Kidapawan City from Barangay Poblacion, Magpet when a roadside bomb went off in Purok Kabisig at 6 p.m. Monday.
Anadon, a resident of Parang, Maguindanao, was the driver of one of two police vehicles used by the North Cotabato Provincial Police Mobile Force that were hit by an anti-personnel landmine planted by New People’s Army (NPA) militants.
Eleven other police officers were injured, two of them still confined at the Amas Provincial Hospital in Kidapawan City.
Chief Supt. Eliseo Rasco, police director for Region 12, condemned the communist rebels’ use of anti-personnel landmines.
Rasco lauded other police officers who stood their ground following the explosion by trading bullets with the NPA ambushers.
Police in Magpet believed the NPAs also suffered fatalities but carried their comrades as they fled deep into the forest.
Rasco appealed to the public in Region 12 to help the police eradicate the terrorists and remain extra vigilant against terrorism. The Communist Party of the Philippines/NPA is listed as a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union. (PNA)
