214 C. Luzon villages on AFP poll watchlist

SAN FERNANDO, Pampanga, Philippines – The Armed Forces’ Northern Luzon Command (Nolcom), which will assist the police in the Oct. 28 barangay elections in Central Luzon, has identified 214 barangays as “areas of concern” in the region.

Col. Ernesto Torres, operations chief of the Army’s 7th Infantry Division, said in a Philippine Information Agency-sponsored forum here yesterday that 61 of these barangays are in eight towns in Aurora and 153 in 29 barangays in Nueva Ecija.

For the barangay polls, Nolcom will deploy 443 field units and 518 augmentation forces in various parts of Central Luzon, Torres said.

This would be on top of quick response forces comprising 147 soldiers from the 7th ID, 518 from augmentation forces, and 685 from field units, or a total of 1,350, to be activated during the elections, he added.

Torres said only one election-related killing has so far been reported in Central Luzon. He identified the victim as Rogelio Gayla, an incumbent councilman in Barangay San Nicolas in Victoria, Tarlac, who was stabbed dead by a rival last Oct. 10.

Torres said that Nolcom’s 702nd Infantry Brigade would assist the Commission on Elections and the police in the village polls in Aurora and Nueva Ecija, while the 703rd IB would assist in the rest of Central Luzon, including Pampanga, Tarlac, Zambales, Bataan, and Bulacan.

In an interview, Torres said communist groups have fielded candidates in the barangay polls, adding though that the Communist Party is no longer illegal. 

 â€œThere is nothing contrary to law if communists run for barangay elections, for as long as there is no violence involved, and they do not carry firearms,” he said.

Meanwhile, in Western Visayas, police have placed 449 barangays on their election watchlist, representing 11 percent of total 4,051 barangays in the region.

Of the number, Chief Superintendent Agrimero Cruz Jr., Region 6 police director, said 436 barangays are categorized as areas of concern, and the rest, areas of immediate concern. No village was identified as area of grave concern.

Most of the poll hotspots (430) are on the watchlist because of threats from communist insurgents, while the 13 others has had a history of political violence. – With Jennifer Rendon