NPA-free barangays to get P20 million government aid

DAVAO CITY, Philippines — President Duterte has started giving away P20 million worth of projects to each barangay that has emerged as free of the presence of the New People’s Army (NPA), especially those in the hinterlands.

The President started the distribution during the joint meeting of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) in Cagayan de Oro City the other night.

The NTF-ELCAC program has received P19 billion under the 2021 budget, with a total of 822 barangays receiving the development assistance.

During the meeting, Duterte called on the rebels fighting the government to lay down their arms and abandon their cause.

“You want to fight me, the government? I have plenty of tanks, I have many policemen and I have many soldiers. You’re just trying to hold on to this war. In one of the encounters, maybe you will get shot and die for nothing,” Duterte said at the meeting also attended by National Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon Jr. and other concerned Cabinet members.

The President told the NPA rebels there is no sense fighting government and instead, they should come back to the fold of the law to have a better life for themselves and their families.

Duterte said the NPA rebels should realize how they have been living a hard life fighting in the mountains while their leaders live comfortably in the cities.

The President lamented how the children of these communist leaders are sent to schools abroad while their own children have barely enough to live on.

Esperon said there are 822 barangays under NPA influence cleared from 2016 to 2019, with 119 of them in Region 10.

“These barangays will have P20 million each. This is for farm-to-market roads, classrooms, electricity, health station, water system, irrigation,” Esperon added.