Mayor: No Red recruitment in 'Caloocan City College', other schools in city
MANILA, Philippines — Caloocan City Mayor Oscar Malapitan has confirmed “Caloocan City College”—one of the schools tagged by the military as alleged recruitment grounds for communist rebels in a plot to overthrow President Rodrigo Duterte—does not exist.
Brig. Gen. Antonio Parlade Jr., Armed Forces of the Philippines assistant deputy chief of staff for operations, on Wednesday accused the Communist Party of the Philippines recruiting film showings on martial law to unseat the chief executive.
“Walang City College of Caloocan, walang ganun. University of Caloocan lang,” Malapitan was quoted as saying in an ABS-CBN report.
CHED records show that one of the academic institutions in the list released by AFP — the Caloocan City College — does not exist. @PhilippineStar
— Janvic Mateo (@jvrmateoSTAR) October 3, 2018
“Caloocan City College” also does not also exist on records from the Commission on Higher Education.
The existing local government-funded academic institution in Caloocan City is the University of Caloocan City. It was previously called Caloocan City Community College when it was established in 1971 then Caloocan City Polytechnic College from 1974 to 2011.
Malapitan also denied that there are supposed recruitment efforts by the communist rebels in the schools within the city.
“Wala kaming makitang lead. Kung meron man, ipapaalam ko kaagad sa AFP o sa pulis at kami na mangunguna. Pero wala kaming monitor,” he said.
(We couldn't find any leads. If there are any, I'd immediately tell the AFP or the police and we'd be the first to act against it. But we haven't monitored any.)
Malapitan, in a DZMM interview, reassured the public that the University of Caloocan has a small campus and it would be easy to monitor activities like film viewings that the AFP claims are being used to recruit students to rebel against the government.
He said in a DZMM interview that he had also talked to officials of the University of the East campus in Caloocan and was told there had been no communist recruitment monitored.
AFP used unverified info
Students and officials of universities and colleges in the list denied their participation in the alleged ‘Red October’ plot. They lamented that the unsubstantiated claim of the soldiers vilifies legal student organizations and endangers the lives of students.
AFP on Thursday admitted it has provided the public with unconfirmed information about the educational institutions where communists were allegedly recruiting students in a plot to kick Duterte out from office.
“The list of Metro Manila schools that have been possibly used as venues for arousing, organizing, and mobilizing of students by the New People’s Army has been released. Some of the schools included in the list as such, however, are subject of continuing validation,” AFP said in a statement.
Gathering military intelligence is confidential in nature, but it is presupposed that when information is already publicized, it has already been verified to avoid unnecessary panic.
Yet, the military said it shared the unverified information “to create awareness among our people.” — Gaea Katreena Cabico
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