By Jennifer P. Rendon
Self-love?
The Iloilo Police Provincial Office (IPPO) laughed off pro-rebel graffiti in three villages of Tubungan town.
For Colonel Gilbert Gorero, Iloilo police chief, the move is nothing short of showing how desperate the rebel group is in winning the people’s trust and confidence.
“They themselves were the ones who vandalized the area and proclaimed that they love the NPA (New People’s Army). That’s proclaiming self-love, which is akin to egotism or even narcissism,” he said.
According to Lieutenant Jose Romel Samson, Tubungan police chief, they learned about the pre-NPA graffiti sometime last week.
The graffiti read “We love NPA,” and “No to CSP.” These were spotted in barangays Sibacauan, Singon, and Male.
They were painted on five electric posts, two on waiting sheds, one on the bridge, and two on the paved road.
Samson said that village officials have already “erased” some of the graffiti, but had a hard time removing the ones on utility posts.
Local police authorities believed that the conduct of Community Support Program (CSP) in Tubungan and its neighboring towns led to the graffiti.
CSP teams from both the PNP and Philippine Army were deployed in 15 villages of Tubungan. But the three villages where the graffiti were found were not included in the deployment.
CSP is a people-centered program which aims to bring peace and development in conflict-affected barangays. It is an initiative of our state forces to bring the government closer to the people through an immediate delivery of basic services, especially to grassroots communities.
The CSP teams will act as facilitators in addressing the issues on the exploitation of the communist terrorists in the communities in collaboration with various national government agencies (NGAs), local government agencies (LGAs), LGUs, and other stakeholders.
“We don’t have a doubt that they did it. They want to hinder the conduct of CSP but failed,” Samson said.
Meanwhile, Gorero said what the NPA did was nothing short of confirming that the government is effective in its efforts against the local terrorist group.
“We mean to end the insurgency of the province. CSP will bring development and economic stabilty in far flung barangays,” he said.
The Iloilo top cop also assured that PNP and AFP will vigorously bring peace and progress by utilizing government agencies program.
“Bringing the services near to the people. Let us not easily be swayed by the CPP-NPA’s desperate move to hinder government programs,” Gorero said.
