GENERAL SANTOS CITY (MindaNews/27 Nov) -- Fifty seven? Fifty nine? Sixty?

Government social workers have expressed confusion over the conflicting figures of casualties from last Monday’s gruesome killings in Maguindanao province after their ongoing verification confirmed 60 victims, three more than the official figures released by the Philippine National Police (PNP).

She said the tally was based on the actual number of bodies that were moved out from the massacre site in Sitio Masalay, Barangay Salman in Ampatuan, Maguindanao during the two-day retrieval operations, which the PNP officially listed at 57.

“Our list was based on the number of bodies that were transported from the retrieval site to the funeral parlors. We really don’t know how this happened but we verified and validated our list and it came out that there were 60 victims and not 57,” Benito said.

Last Monday , joint police, Army and civilian search and retrieval teams initially found at least 22 bodies scattered in a hilly portion of Sitio Masalay and later retrieved 24 more remains at a shallow grave in the area.

At least 11 more bodies were retrieved last Wednesday from a second grave, where three vehicles were also dumped.

On Thursday morning, the PNP’s scene of the crime operations (Soco) team officially ended their operation and said they retrieved 57 bodies from the area, 21 of whom were males and 36 were female. 

Twenty seven of the victims were journalists from the cities of General Santos, Koronadal, Cotabato, Tacurong and Davao.

On Thursday afternoon, the DSWD initially gave the death toll at 59 but officials of the Region 12 Soco team insisted there were only 57.

“Right now, we’re confused with the figures so we’re planning to meet with the Soco team to compare and validate our respective lists,” Benito said.

The Freedom Fund for Filipino Journalists (FFFJ) and South East Asia Press Alliance) is giving financial assistance to the slain journalists while the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP).

Rowena Paraan, NUJP safety officer, said they were still verifying the list of casualties, saying that the NUJP was informed that about 34 journalists reportedly joined the convoy of the members of the Mangudadatu family and their two lawyers to Shariff Aguak town in Maguindanao last Monday.

Members of the Mangudadatu clan were supposed to file last Monday morning the certificate of candidacy for governor of Buluan Vice Mayor Ismael Mangudadatu at the Commission on Elections (Comelec) provincial office in Shariff Aguak. The six-vehicle convoy never made it to the Comelec office after they were reportedly stopped by an armed group along the national highway in Barangay Saniag, Ampatuan and brought to the vicinity of barangay Salman where they were later executed. (Allen V. Estabillo / Mindanews)

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