News Update NPA rebels biggest threat to May polls - PNP, AFP

Communist rebels remain to be the biggest threat in the conduct of peaceful elections in May, ranking police and military officials said Wednesday. Deputy Director General Edgardo Acuna, deputy chief for operations of the Philippine National Police (PNP), said the New People’s Army (NPA) has been the leading security threat during polls ever since it started extorting money from candidates through it “permit-to-campaign" policy. “The permit-to-campaign disturbs the entry and exit of candidates in their so-called controlled areas," Acuna told reporters on Wednesday. The NPA’s extortion scheme makes the armed group more threatening than the Abu Sayyaf bandit group and private armed groups controlled by some local politicians, the police official said. Major General Gaudencio Pangilinan, the military’s deputy chief of staff for operations, meanwhile said that the NPA’s money-making ventures, especially in the Bicol Region, have been proven by document seized in some clashes with the armed group. Pangilinan said that color-coded permit-to-campaign cards the military seized from a raid in Catanduanes showed that the rebel group demands money ranging from P10,000 to P500,000. According to military records, the NPA earned a total of P136 million from its extortion activities in 2009, which will supposedly be used to support certain candidates in the May polls. In a statement released last month, however, the NPA said its permit-to-campaign scheme eliminates election-related violence in some of its known turf. The military had earlier called on local candidates to refrain from giving in to the NPA’s extortion activities, saying the amount will only be used to fund the group’s counter-offensives against the government. The military had also said it would intensify its efforts to stop the extortion efforts by the communist rebel group, which it vowed to crush before President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s term ends in June. - Andreo Calonzo/KBK, GMANews.TV
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