City fire office eyes ‘zero fire’ on election day

CEBU, Philippines — The Cebu City Fire Office (CCFO) will start deploying fire trucks in various polling centers two days before the May 9, 2022 elections to ensure no fire incident on election day.

Senior Officer 2 Wendell Villanueva, CCFO information officer, said they have at least 145 personnel to conduct routine patrol every two hours. There will also be 20 standby personnel at the Regional Election Monitoring and Action Center at the Police Regional Office (PRO)-7.

According to Villanueva, the BFP is among the various agencies tasked to secure the elections.

Villanueva said the CCFO will be deploying fire trucks starting tomorrow that will be patrolling the polling centers every two hours.

"And on Monday, atong mga fire trucks will be roving sa ilang mga respective AOR (area of responsibility) every hour sa mga polling centers," said Villanueva.

Aside from this, an incident command post has been established in Pahina Fire substation and Cebu City Hall.

Villanueva said they have also started inspection of polling centers to make sure that fire-safety equipment has been complied.

"Nga naa silay mga fire-safety equipment sad, duna tay report na submit ana, tanan gyud nga eskwelahan ato na ng nabisita," he added. They have also checked the vital installations such as gas stations.

The BFP has to make sure that fire incidents during the elections are prevented. Election staff at the polling centers have been previously trained what to do in case a fire breaks out during the elections.

"Ato i-make sure nga walay sunog kay nasayod man ta pag naay sunog maputol ang kuryente, unya og way kuryente atoang pag-botar kay kinahanglan man og source of power, naa nyay mga delay og uban pang mga problema," said Villanueva.

During the inspections, Villanueva admitted that some polling centers did not have enough fire safety equipment while other schools have substantially complied. To address the deficiency in some polling centers, fire trucks will be on patrol every two hours. Fire volunteer brigades will also help secure the polling centers.

Villanueva has appealed to the public to be extra cautious when leaving their respective houses to exercise their votes. He added that all plugs and circuits should be shut down fully before leaving their houses to vote to make sure that will not cause any fire incident. —FPL (FREEMAN)