Monday, August 26, 2019

AFP installs new Zambo City anti-terror TF chief

From the Philippine News Agency (Aug 26, 2019): AFP installs new Zambo City anti-terror TF chief


CHANGE OF COMMAND. Col. Leonel Nicolas (right) relinquishes his command as the Joint Task Force Zamboanga commander, to Col. Antonio John Divinagracia (partly covered) on Monday(August 26). Maj. Gen. Roberto Ancan, Army's 1st Infantry Division commander (left), presided over the turnover of command at Camp Gen. Arturo Enrile in Zamboanga City. (Photo by Teofilo P. Garcia Jr.)

The newly installed commander of the anti-terrorist Joint Task Force Zamboanga (JTFZ) has been ordered to defend this city "at all cost from terror and other threat groups."

Maj. Gen. Roberto Ancan, Army’s 1st Infantry Division commander, issued the order Monday as he
installed Col. Antonio John Divinagracia as the new commander of JTFZ, replacing Col. Leonel Nicolas.

“I know you can do it,” Ancan told Divinagracia citing “I know how you defended Zamboanga City during the 2013 siege” as a battalion commander for a mechanized Army unit.

Ancan told Divinagracia to sustain the peace and security programs of his predecessor, who served as JTFZ commander for two years and five months with zero enemy atrocities.

Nicolas has been designated at the new commander of the Army’s 102nd Infantry Brigade based in Ipil, Zamboanga Sibugay.

Divinagracia thanked his senior officers and the higher headquarters of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) for trusting him to lead the JTFZ.

Divinagracia, a native of this city, vowed to do his best as the new JTFZ commander and ordered his subordinate commanders “to tell your men that we are here to secure Zamboanga City.”

As JTFZ commander, Divinagracia has two battalions under his command-- the Army’s 74th Infantry Battalion and Marine Battalion Landing Team-11 (MBLT-11).

“We must be prepared to detect, deter, apprehend, and if we have to neutralize terrorists, so be it,” Divinagracia told his two subordinate unit commanders.

“We must always think that we will win over our enemies and break their will to think and carry out acts of terrorism,” he added.

He said protecting Zamboanga City from acts of terrorism could be challenging “because we are confronting an almost invisible enemy” whose main intention is to create havoc among the people.

Both Divinagracia and Nicolas belong to the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) Class of 1991.

Previously, Divinagracia was assigned as the deputy commander of the then Army’s 104th Infantry Brigade, which is re-designated as the 101st Infantry Brigade, based in Basilan province.

https://www.pna.gov.ph/articles/1078754

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.