Philippine Coast Guard officer shot dead

COTABATO CITY (January 16, 2026) — A gunman killed an official of the Philippine Coast Guard in a brazen attack at a busy thoroughfare in Barangay Veterans Village in Ipil, Zamboanga Sibugay on Thursday night, January 16.

Lieutenant Junior Grade Glennick Ytang, commander of the Philippine Coast Guard Ipil Substation, covering the territorial seas of the Zamboanga Sibugay province in Region 9, died instantly from bullet wounds sustained in the attack.

Col. Barnard Danie Dasugo, Zamboanga Sibugay provincial police director, said on Friday that Ytang has just embarked on his white pick-up truck, parked along a street in Purok Sentro in Barangay Veterans Village, from a roadside coffee shop and was to start its engine when a man came close and shot him repeatedly.

Dasugo and his superiors in the Police Regional Office 9 separately told reporters that the assailant of Ytang immediately escaped, now subject of an extensive manhunt by personnel of the Ipil Municipal Police Station and intelligence agents from the Zamboanga Sibugay provincial police force.

Police investigators and forensic experts found six empty shells of pistol cartridges at the scene.

Lt. Gen. Donald Gumiran, commander of the Western Mindanao Command based in Zamboanga City, said on Friday that Army intelligence units in Zamboanga Sibugay will help police investigators identify the killer of Ytang.

Witnesses told reporters on Friday two other men acted as lookouts from a distance while Ytang’s assailant approached him and opened fire.

Police investigators and municipal officials in Ipil have requested the owners of business establishments around the spot where Ytang was shot dead to provide them with security camera recordings to hasten their effort of putting a closure to the incident.

Photo shows police forensic experts sifting through the scene of the gun attack that resulted in the immediate death of Ytang.