CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY, (PNA) -– Cagayan de Oro City Mayor Oscar Moreno on Wednesday bucked inaccurate reports on the number of alleged victims of “summary killings” here in the past months.
“The report was erroneous and bloated,” Moreno said when interviewed over a radio station here.
A police report alleged that the number of victims of “salvaging” or “summary killings” in this port capital has risen to 20 since August this year.
“We are still collating the reports of killings perpetrated for the months of January 2013 until July 2013. But, for the month of August 2013 to end of September 2013, we have recorded a total of 18 killings, all alleged victims of summary killings,” Supt. Adonis Mutia of the city’s investigative and detection department.
Moreno, however, resisted the police report, saying the report on 18 victims of summary killings was erroneous and “unfair” to Cagayan de Oro City.
He said that the 18 total number of victims killed through alleged summary killings reflected the killings occurring in the entire island of Mindanao in the reported period.
“It is hard to project that the criminality in the city has become alarming when it is contrary to the truth,” Moreno said.
He said he would ask Senior Supt. Graciano Mijares, the city’s police chief, to clear the number especially killings related to alleged summary executions.
Moreno would also ask Mijares to inform his office of the name of the police official who publicly reported that murders in Cagayan de Oro reached a total of 18 in two months time.