Communist rebels remain to be the biggest threat in the conduct of
peaceful elections in May, ranking police and military officials said
Wednesday.
Deputy Director General Edgardo Acuna, deputy chief for operations of
the Philippine National Police (PNP), said the New People’s Army (NPA)
has been the leading security threat during polls ever since it started
extorting money from candidates through it “permit-to-campaign" policy.
“The permit-to-campaign disturbs the entry and exit of candidates in
their so-called controlled areas," Acuna told reporters on Wednesday.
The NPA’s extortion scheme makes the armed group more threatening than
the Abu Sayyaf bandit group and private armed groups controlled by some
local politicians, the police official said.
Major General Gaudencio Pangilinan, the military’s deputy chief of staff
for operations, meanwhile said that the NPA’s money-making ventures,
especially in the Bicol Region, have been proven by document seized in
some clashes with the armed group.
Pangilinan said that color-coded permit-to-campaign cards the military
seized from a raid in Catanduanes showed that the rebel group demands
money ranging from P10,000 to P500,000.
According to military records, the NPA earned a total of P136 million from its extortion
activities in 2009, which will supposedly be used to support certain
candidates in the May polls.
In a statement released last month, however, the NPA said its
permit-to-campaign scheme eliminates election-related violence in some of its
known turf.
The military had earlier called on local candidates to refrain from giving
in to the NPA’s extortion activities, saying the amount will only be
used to fund the group’s counter-offensives against the government.
The military had also said it would intensify its efforts to stop the extortion efforts
by the communist rebel group, which it vowed to crush before President
Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s term ends in June.
David Mikael Taclino
Inyu Web Development and Design
Creative Writer
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