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CABANATUAN CITY—The Commission on Elections (Comelec)
has approved the deployment of additional policemen and
Army troops to Nueva Ecija (NE), to help preempt further
election-related violence, the latest being the killing
of three barangay officials in Talugtog town on Tuesday.
The
Comelec had been closely watching Nueva Ecija, that is
considered as second only to Abra in terms of
election-related violence, and one of the 10 election
hot spots in the country.
Nueva
Ecija is the only province in
Central Luzon to be declared election hot spot.
Chief
Supt. Ismael Rafanan,
Central Luzon police commander, announced the deployment of 100 more
policemen under a newly created Provisional Task Force
to augment the Nueva Ecija police command.
The
Comelec also asked the assistance of the Army’s 702nd
Infantry Brigade to support the police in securing peace
in the province during the election time.
“This
does not mean that Nueva Ecija is under Comelec control.
We have to correct the impression,” said Emmanuel
Ignacio, Comelec deputy director for Central Luzon and
the officer in charge of the Office of the Election
Supervisor in the province.
Ignacio,
who held a press briefing at the National Police
headquarters here Wednesday morning, said the move was
part of the “second stage” of the commission’s election
preparation. The first stage was the completion of the
re-registration of voters and the acceptance of
disqualification petitions of certain candidates.
Ignacio
stressed that Nueva Ecija is only an “area of concern”
and not yet under Comelec control.
A
province is placed under Comelec control, he said, when:
•
communist rebels, terrorists and private armed groups
operate in the area;
• there
is intense political rivalry; and
• it has
a history of election-related violence.
Rafanan
said the recent violent incidents prompted the creation
of the the Provisional Task Force, headed by Senior
Supt. Alfredo Caballes, to augment the existing force of
the Nueva Ecija police command headed by Senior Supt.
Allen Bantolo.
Rafanan
and Ignacio, however, emphasized that the activation of
the Provisional Task Force and the deployment of more
Army troops in Nueva Ecija, is only a preemptive action.
Bantolo,
for his part, said he needs a battalion of Army troops
to back the 777 policemen deployed in the province,
particularly in the seven identified “critical” areas of
Cabanatuan City,
Gapan City, San Isidro, San Antonio, Aliaga, Licab and
Talugtog.
The only
election-related crimes that had happened so far in
Nueva Ecija include the killing of Talugtog barangay
officials Liberato Ramos, Juanito Doña and Eusebio
Jimenez on Tuesday; the killing of a candidate for
councilor Ariel de la Merced in Licab and the grenade
throwing incident in a Gapan City cockpit arena that
resulted in the death of five members of a political
family.
In
Lucena City, some 30 black-clad journalists from Quezon,
Laguna and Batangas provinces held an indignation rally
to condemn the ambush of two Quezon journalists last
Thursday.
Delfin
Mallari and Johnny Glorioso, the reporters who were
ambushed by two motorcycle-riding gunmen, were joined by
their colleagues in a motorcade around the city’s major
streets.
The
protesters carried placards and chanted “Kalayaang
magpahayag, ipaglaban!” and “Stop killing journalists.”
The
ralliers were mostly members of the National Union of
Journalists of the Philippines in Quezon, Laguna and
Batangas. --With
J. Bello |
