Cotabato City, Philippines  - A soldier shot dead his sergeant and a fellow soldier in the southern Philippines after he was scolded for being drunk, a military spokesman said Monday.

A third soldier was wounded in the shooting late Sunday inside an army outpost in Barira town in Maguindanao province, 960 kilometres south of Manila.

Colonel Jonathan Ponce, a spokesman for the army's 6th Infantry Division, said army Corporal Jefferson Brillo escaped after the incident.

He said Brillo's superior, Sergeant Alex Gumata, scolded him when he came in late for his duty on Sunday evening.

"Brillo was intoxicated coming from a drinking session in a store near the headquarters," Ponce said. "Gumata scolded him and told him he should not have drank because he was on duty."

The suspect left the outpost after the scolding, but immediately came back with his service firearm and shot at Gumata and the two other soldiers.