Cotabato City, Philippines  - Five people were wounded when an improvised bomb exploded in a southern Philippine town, a regional military spokesman said Saturday.

The explosion occurred late Friday in front of a gymnasium in Maitum town in Sarangani province, 990 kilometres south of Manila, Major Randolph Cabangbang said.

The officer blamed a faction of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) rebel group that attacked towns and seized villages in August after the Supreme Court stopped the signing of a territorial agreement between the government and MILF.

"Basically, the rogue MILF rebels are our suspects," he said. "It [the bombing] is meant to ease the military pressure on them."

Government troops have been hunting down at least three MILF commanders involved in the August attacks.

Subsequent government-MILF clashes resulted in the killings of nearly 300 people and displacement of hundreds of thousands of civilians.

The 12,000-strong MILF has been fighting for an independent Islamic state in the southern Philippines since 1978. The group entered into peace negotiations with the government in 1997. (dpa)