Philippine mayor survives ambush after President Rodrigo Duterte threatened to kill him
Cebu town mayor Vicente Loot has been accused of having links to the drugs trade
A Philippine mayor accused of involvement in narcotics trafficking survived an ambush on Sunday, police said, four months after President Rodrigo Duterte publicly threatened to kill him.
Retired police chief superintendent Vicente Loot, a mayor in the central province of Cebu, had been repeatedly named by Duterte as one of the so-called “narco-generals” protecting the illegal drug trade.
Loot on Sunday was on a boat arriving with his family at a port in the Cebu town of Daanbantayan when unidentified gunmen opened fire and wounded four people, police said. The mayor was unhurt.
“We are looking at all possible motives and angles, including his being tagged in the narco-list, politics, or his previous work in the police force,” acting town police chief Senior Inspector Irish Dilem said.
Loot told radio DZMM he was urging authorities to investigate the incident but refused to speculate on the motive. He denies links to drugs.
