3 gunmen killed in clash after ambush on Maguindanao del Sur mayor

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January 25, 2026 | 3:19pm

COTABATO CITY, Philippines — Police and soldiers killed three gunmen who ambushed the mayor of Shariff Aguak, Maguindanao del Sur, with a B40 anti-tank rocket and rifles on Sunday, January 25, wounding two of his bodyguards.

The slain ambushers first attacked the convoy of Mayor Akmad Ampatuan Sr. and his companions on a street in Shariff Aguak, then escaped in a grey minivan.

The ambush left two escorts of the mayor, Private 1st Class Manuel Arcega Dondiego of the Army’s 90th Infantry Battalion and the ethnic Maguindanaon Lakman Eso Tips, wounded.

Emergency responders immediately brought them to the Bangsamoro Regional Hospital, less than a kilometer away from the center of Shariff Aguak, for treatment.

Local executives, among them members of the multi-sector Shariff Aguak Municipal Peace and Order Council, and senior police officials in Maguindanao del Sur told reporters at noon Sunday that pursuing volunteer community watchmen, policemen and soldiers cornered the culprits in Barangay Meta in nearby Datu Unsay, Maguindanao del Sur, but resisted and opened fire, provoking a gunfight. 

The three ambushers, whom local officials identified as Budtong Alim Pendatun, Tekz Malid Pendatun and Puasa Oting Madid, died from multiple gunshot wounds sustained in the brief clash.

Local executives and traditional Moro community leaders told reporters that it was Ampatuan who was the target of the ambush, not any of the passengers in the vehicles trailing behind.

The mayor was wounded in a similar attack more than a decade ago at a stretch of the Cotabato-Isulan Highway, about two towns away, while on his way to Cotabato City from Shariff Aguak.