“Matobato tried to kill me in 2014”

“Nakurutan ko, wala ko nakatingog,” a retired agrarian reform adjudicator said, in reference to that time he saw Edgar Matobato’s face on TV during the senate hearing on extrajudicial killings.

Photo from Rappler

“I clearly remember his eyes, nose, and mouth, every attribute, including his ball cap. He is the same person who tried to kill me on October 23, 2014,” Abeto Salcdeo Jr. said.

At present, Salcdeo is consulting his lawyer about a possibility of filing a case against Matobato.

Matobato testified during a Senate committee’s hearing on extrajudicial killings that are allegedly related to the Duterte administraion’s war on drugs. He claimed that he was a part of the Davao Death Squad and alleged that Duterte, during his term as the city mayor, ordered the killings of criminals and enemies.


However, there are some inconsistencies. Salcdeo said that the date of the ambush was October 23, 2014 but Matobato that time was supposedly under the Witness Protection Program of the Department of Justics, which was then under De Lima.

Salcedo recalled that he was aboard the pickup truck of the Department of Agrarian Reform when he heard gunshots at the junction of Bonifacio Street and Bago Aplaya in Digos City, Davao del Sur. He was seated in the front. He got 6 gunshot wounds, and three bullets have yet to be removed from his body.

“I can clearly remember his face because he was so close to me, only the glass window separated us,” he said. 

Furthermore, he disclosed that he was informed that the group was involved in the ambush were hired guns and were promised P400,000. It could have been carried out because of a land dispute.

At that time, an official had been pressuring Salcedo to change the ruling over a huge land that was being planned to be used by foreign investors. ASCS

Source: Rappler

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