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John Unson - Philstar.com
August 19, 2026 | 6:40pm
Personnel of the Cotabato City Police Office are guarding tightly against unauthorized carrying of guns by residents, including students in different schools in all barangays under its jurisdiction.
Philstar.com / John Unson
COTABATO CITY, Philippines — The police and military have fused ranks to embark on the prevention of violence in school campuses in Central Mindanao, where possession of firearms by residents is a longtime culture, both as a status symbol and as protection from adversaries.
Brig. Gen. Ricky Bunayog, acting commander of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, and officials of the Police Regional Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region, including their regional director, Brig. Gen. Christopher Abecia, separately told reporters on Wednesday, August 19, that they shall together set measures meant to preclude any shooting incident in schools in Central Mindanao as what happened on Tuesday in Zamboanga City.
Abecia had tasked his subordinate-officers in Cotabato City, in the Bangsamoro Special Geographic Area and in the provinces of Maguindanao del Sur and Maguindanao del Norte to immediately plan out, along with counterparts in units of 6th ID and in the Army's 103rd Infantry Brigade in Marawi City, essential programs that can forestall such an incident in any school campus in areas under their jurisdiction.
“We are not taking chances. We will embark, along with local executives and counterparts in the military, on activities to ensure the safety of elementary pupils, high school and college students in school campuses under our jurisdiction,” Abecia said.
A male junior high school student killed a classmate with a pistol and, subsequently, shot himself dead after his rampage inside the campus of the Ateneo De Zamboanga University (AdZU) in Barangay Tumaga in Zamboanga City on Tuesday morning.
Local officials and investigators from the Zamboanga City Police Office told reporters after the incident that the attacker, armed with a pistol and a short-type customized combat rifle, barged into a room in the fourth floor of a school building in the AdZU campus and opened fire at his classmates, killing one of them, a male honor student.
The gunshots that reverberated through the classrooms in the school building caused panic among students.
After the shooting Frenzy, the attacker went down to the third floor of the building and, there, shot himself with a pistol, killing himself instantly.
“That incident is something we don’t want to happen in any of the schools in areas being secured by our units,” said Bunayog, who has operational control over the 601st, 602nd and 603rd Infantry and the 1st Mechanized Infantry Brigades that have battalions scattered across Central Mindanao.
Bunayog said they shall intensify the enforcement in Central Mindanao of the Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW) Management Program of the 6th ID and the Office of the Presidential Adviser on Peace Reconciliation and Unity.
Units of the 6th ID implementing the SALW Management Program had collected a total of 3,891 assault rifles of various calibers, pistols and revolvers, machine pistols, M60, .30 and .50 caliber machineguns, B40 rocket and 40 millimeter grenade launchers since the division and OPAPRU started its implementation in Central Mindanao in July 2024.
