MANILA, Philippines — A University of the Philippines (UP) professor who was on her way to a cemetery in Tandang Sora was threatened by an armed man, purportedly a bodyguard of a VIP, in a traffic altercation along Congressional Avenue in Quezon City Monday noon.
A report in the Quezon City Police District Criminal Investigation and Detection Unit (QCPD CIDU) said the still unidentified bodyguard displayed his gun and threatened a female professor, who was with her family in a Toyota Fortuner.
The professor refused to be identified for security purposes.
She said they were on their way to Himlayang Pilipino when a Toyota Innova followed by a heavily-tinted Toyota Land Cruiser cut them off around 12 noon.
The woman’s son, who was driving the Fortuner, was forced to pull over.
It was then that the bodyguard got off the Innova’s front passenger seat, drew his firearm, cursed at the victim and said: “Hindi mo ba alam na may binabantayan kaming convoy (Didn’t you know that we’re guarding a convoy)?”
While on the Fortuner’s passenger seat, the professor told off the bodyguard and asked him to calm down.
Aside from the professor and her son, inside the vehicle were the professor’s daughter-in-law and two girls aged five and six.
After the brief altercation, the bodyguard returned to the Innova then sped off together with the Land Cruiser.
A verification made with the Land Transportation Office said the Innova, with a ZEL 124 plate number, was registered under the name of a certain Priscilla Francisco Meneses, a resident of Barangay (village) Bambang, Bulacan town, Bulacan province.
Meneses is reportedly the mother of Bulacan town Mayor Patrick Meneses.
The Land Cruiser, meanwhile, was bearing a PQS 904 plate number. Its ownership was registered under Mactab Construction Supply wit business address at N. Domingo Street in San Juan City.
President Aquino promised a ‘no wang-wang’ policy when he took office, but multitudes of government officials and their associates still travel with bodyguards in convoys, silently pushing and bullying their way through traffic.
INQUIRER.net is trying to reach the Meneseses for comment. -With report by Julliane Love De Jesus
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