GENERAL SANTOS CITY — The Police Regional Office in Region 12 (PRO-12) is deploying around 6,500 police personnel and peacekeeping volunteers to secure cemeteries and public areas in Region 12 or Soccsksargen during the observance of “Undas” or All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day.
Chief Supt. Eliseo Tam Rasco, PRO-12 regional director, said Tuesday that the region’s 4,094 active police commissioned officers and non-commissioned officers will be fully deployed during the annual holidays on Thursday and Friday.
He said these personnel are from the regional, provincial and city police offices, municipal police stations and mobile forces’ units.
“This is to ensure the orderly and peaceful observance of the Undas. We’re targeting zero crime rate and zero casualty during the period,” Rasco said.
He said their personnel would be augmented by some 2,453 force multipliers composed of barangay peacekeeping teams and local volunteer groups.
In support of the “Ligtas Undas 2018” campaign, the Department of Health, Philippine Red Cross, Bureau of Fire Protection and the Army-led Joint Task Force GenSan have committed to deploy support teams in local cemeteries, he said.
Rasco and other PRO-12 officials led on Tuesday morning the send-off ceremony for the police personnel and volunteers who will be assigned for the “Undas”.
In a briefer, the PRO-12 said a total 939 police personnel and 400 force multipliers will secure the eight cemeteries here.
The main concentration of the deployment will be at the city’s main public cemetery, the Antonio C. Acharon Memorial Park in Uhaw, Barangay Fatima and at the Forest Lake Memorial Park, the biggest private cemetery in the area.
Some 735 police personnel and 406 volunteers will secure various private and public cemeteries in South Cotabato; 876 police personnel and 114 volunteers in Sultan Kudarat; 530 police personnel and 259 volunteers in Sarangani; 354 police personnel and 100 volunteers in Cotabato City; and, 627 police personnel and 1,138 volunteers in North Cotabato.
Rasco said teams from the regional office will also be deployed in cemeteries to support personnel from local police stations in enforcing usual prohibitions such as the bringing of alcoholic beverages, bladed weapons, firearms, loud speakers and gambling materials.
Some of these will be assigned to conduct covert security monitoring in major cemeteries, he said.
He said those who will not be assigned to cemeteries will render administrative and other office-related duties.
The police official said top officers of the PRO-12 will conduct inspections in different areas to ensure that the assigned personnel would be on their proper posts.
Aside from cemeteries, Rasco said teams will be assigned to secure public terminals, churches, shopping malls, beach resorts, subdivisions and other places of convergence.
He added that the intensified checkpoint operations along national highways as well as in the entry and exit points of key localities will continue during the period. (PNA)
