Negros Occidental’s Escalante City Mayor Melecio Yap, Jr. assured protection for former rebels (FRs) of the New People’s Army (NPA) facing threats from their former colleagues in the dismantled Northern Negros Front (NNF).

“I will not turn my back on you. The government will continue to extend help and provide ways to shield you from any threat as you continue living in the mainstream of society,” Yap said in his message during a meeting with the FRs on Wednesday afternoon, April 12.

In a report yesterday, the Philippine Army’s 79th Infantry Battalion (79IB) said some 40 FRs met with the mayor together with 79IB commander Lt. Colonel J-Jay Javines; Escalante Police Station deputy chief, Major Wence Alcuber; and lawyer Charo Tupas-Fajardo, Escalante legal adviser, at Barangay Old Escalante.

According to the 79IB, the FRs have been receiving letters from the NNF, “discrediting and threatening them for returning to mainstream society and choosing the path to peace.”

They expressed their security concerns to the city government, the Philippine Army and the Philippine National Police, saying the letters were a form of propaganda targeting not only them, but also their active comrades who would want to surrender.

“We would like to request strengthened security and direct communication to counter these threats,” one of the FRs said.

The group thanked the city government, the military and the police for jointly organizing the meeting to assure their safety and to assist them in availing government programs.

Escalante City has the highest number of insurgency-cleared villages in Negros Occidental, totaling at least 14 barangays, which have received funding from the Local Government Support Fund-Support for the Barangay Development Program.

Last April 6, 79IB troops engaged the remnants of the NNF in the hinterlands of the neighboring Toboso town, which left a soldier wounded and led them to recover firearms with ammunition, medicine kits, hammocks, rainboots, and other personal items, and subversive documents.

The NNF — which was part of the NPA’s Komiteng Rehiyon-Negros, Cebu, Bohol, and Siquijor — was declared dismantled by the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the PNP in April 2021.

In the past two years, some of its top leaders have been killed in clashes while some members have surrendered, but others continue to conduct recruitment and recovery efforts in the remote villages of Escalante, and the towns of Toboso and Calatrava, and in other far-flung areas of northern Negros. (PNA)