Navy units seize P93.8-million cigarettes in Sulu operations

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June 20, 2026 | 5:29pm

COTABATO CITY, Philippines — Navy teams seized P93.8 million worth of imported cigarettes in two separate seaborne anti-smuggling operations in the territorial waters of Sulu province in Southern Mindanao on Thursday, June 18.

Army Lt. Gen. Donald Gumiran, commander of the Western Mindanao Command, and officials of the Western Mindanao Naval Command (WMNC) under his operational control told reporters on Saturday that the seized contraband shall be turned over to the Bureau of Customs for its disposition.

Officials of the Sulu Provincial Police Office and the WMNC said on Saturday that a Navy team first intercepted the M/B Aslinda a few miles off Cabucan Island in Hadji Panglima Tahil town in Sulu and found out that it was loaded with 305 boxes of Indonesian-made cigarettes, costing P47.5 million.

Several hours later, another Navy team foiled an attempt by crewmen of the M/V Babyboy to sail through the sea close to Marungas Island in Jolo town in Sulu, enroute to a beachfront area in one of the municipalities in the province for a brief stopover.

The Navy personnel involved in the offshore anti-smuggling operation immediately confiscated all of the 300 boxes of imported cigarettes, worth P46.3 million, piled at the hull of the M/V Babyboy.

Officials of intelligence units of the WestMinCom, the Police Regional Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region and members of the Bangsamoro Business Council (BBC) separately said the M/B Aslinda and the M/V Babyboy were to transport the imported cigarettes to buyers in coastal areas in Maguindanao del Norte province and in Cotabato City and in the adjoining Palimbang, Kalamansig and Lebak towns in Sultan Kudarat in Region 12.

Gumiran said he and his subordinate-officers in the WestMinCom, which has jurisdiction over Army, Marine and Navy units in the Zamboanga peninsula, in Sulu and in all the provinces and cities in the Bangsamoro region are grateful to local executives and members of the BBC and to Chief Minister Abdulrauf Macacua of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao for supporting extensively the WMNC's anti-smuggling operations.

Gumiran said all crewmen of the impounded M/B Aslinda and the M/V Babyboy are now undergoing procedural interrogation as part of the police and the WMNC’s effort to identify the large-scale illegal cigarette traders behind the botched smuggling attempts.