AFP offers P50, 000 ‘cash gift’ to NPA who would surrender with high-caliber firearm

From the Philippine News Agency (Mar 20): AFP offers P50, 000 ‘cash gift’ to NPA who would surrender with high-caliber firearm

The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) has a program that offers “cash gift” amounting P50,000 in exchange for every high-caliber firearm that members of the New People’s Army (NPA) will turn over to the government when they surrender, according to the Philippine Army (PA).

The NPA surrenderers can use the amount as seed money in starting a new life, Lt. Col. Michael Buhat, the commanding officer of the PA’s 49th Infantry Battalion (IB) here said on Wednesday.

Those who will surrender without firearms, however, are still accepted and placed under the Comprehensive Local Integration Program (CLIP), a program of local government units (LGUs) that provides livelihood opportunities to NPA rebels who are returning to the folds of law for them to be able to live decent lives together with their love ones, Buhat said.

“We are disseminating this cash-for-gun program of the AFP not to entice NPAs with money into giving up their hopeless cause against the government but to inform them that should they surrender now, they have something to start with in forming a new life for their families in a peaceful society,” Buhat said.

Part of the efforts for peace that his command is initiating in the province, according to Buhat is the continuous activities being conducted by the Bayanihan Team that goes around barangays to find out the needs of communities and attend to issues villagers are raising.

The Team includes representatives from the departments of agrarian reform (DAR) and of environment and natural resources (DENR), National Commission on Indigenous Peoples (NCIP) and Presidential Agrarian Reform Committee (PARC).

“We have also invited representatives from the Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) into the team for them to attend to problems involving agrarian reform beneficiaries who are encountering difficulties in the payment of amortizations for their Certificate of Land Owned Awards (CLOAs),” Buhat said.

http://www.pna.gov.ph/index.php?idn=2&sid=&nid=2&rid=508962