Pangasinan remains insurgency–free

From the Manila Times (Jun 24, 2023): Pangasinan remains insurgency–free (By Gabriel L. Cardinoza)

LINGAYEN: Pangasinan, the biggest province in the Ilocos Region, remains insurgency-free.

This was the report of Lt. Col. Michael Bautista, commanding officer of the Army's 71st Infantry Battalion, during the joint meeting of the Provincial Development, Provincial Peace and Order, and Provincial Anti-Drug Abuse councils on Thursday, June 22, here.

Bautista, however, asked the council to "reaffirm" the insurgency-free status of the province.

Bautista said that since 2018, when Pangasinan was first declared insurgency-free, no violent insurgency-related incident was recorded in the province.

He attributed this to the team effort of peace-keeping forces and the different local government units (LGUs) in the province, especially with the creation of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict or NTF-Elcac.

The last reported encounter between government forces and the New People's Army took place in the Caraballo Mountains, in the boundary of the upland villages of Malico and Sta. Maria in San Nicolas town in August 2017.

As peace and order council chairman, Gov. Ramon Guico 3rd said he supports the move for the reaffirmation of Pangasinan as insurgency-free.

Vice Gov. Mark Ronald Lambino said that the Philippine National Police and Armed Forces of the Philippines must formalize its request by writing to the provincial board, where it will go through a deliberation before finally passing a resolution to reaffirm the province as insurgency-free.

Bautista clarified that if there were reports before about rebel returnees in some places of the province, these individuals, he said, were already "inactive and they just wanted their names removed from their former organizations."

Meantime, at the meeting of the Regional Peace and Order Council here on June 23, Guico said that his administration has given high importance to the security of the province.

He said that peace and order was an important factor for the province to attain progress.

"One of the major reasons why investments in an LGU or province would flourish is because there is peace and order. So it is a very important component of progress and development," Guico said.

"I believe that peace and order is one of the difficult areas of governance to maintain and even to promote. But I am glad that we have this peace and order council meeting so that the different departments and different stakeholders would come and discuss the possible programs and platforms and actions to be taken," he added.

Guico said that his administration was also promoting a "convergence approach," saying that the different national and local government agencies need not be compartmentalized.

"National and provincial government agencies would come together, share their resources for the cause, common vision and common objectives," Guico said.

https://www.manilatimes.net/2023/06/24/regions/pangasinan-remains-insurgencyfree/1897551