ILOILO City – The Christmas celebration in Western Visayas was generally peaceful and orderly, with no major incidents, according to Police Brigadier General Leo Francisco, director of the Police Regional Office 6 (PRO-6).
“So far based on our monitoring, no major incidents happened….We hope tuloy-tuloy ito hanggang matapos ang New Year,” Francisco said.
According to PRO-6’s crime volume records, there were 510 incidents from Dec. 16 to 25 – 36.48 percent less than the incidents recorded the same period last year.
“The decisive interventions and collective efforts of all line units through the effective implementation of operational concepts focused on Enhanced Managing Police Operations (EMPO) strategies were manifested in the notable decline in crime incidents and peaceful celebration of Christmas,” Francisco said.
On the part of eight focus crimes, there’s a decrease of 71.79 percent, or 84 incidents, compared to 117 incidents in 2021.
The eight focus crimes included murder, homicide, robbery, physical injury, theft, rape, motornapping, and carnapping.
The PRO-6 recorded one stray bullet incident with no injured individuals and one firecracker-related incident with one injured individual.
Francisco said that among the reasons why the Christmas celebration was peaceful was the deployment of 2,492 police personnel and the mobilization of 8,473 force multipliers in churches, terminals, ports, malls, markets, commercial areas, parks, tourist destinations, and other places of convergence.
“Ako po ay nagpapasalamat sa aking kapulisan, sa ating partner agencies, stakeholders, local government units, at higit sa lahat sa ating pong komunidad sa inyong kooperasyon para sa payapa, tahimik at masayang pagdiriwang ng Pasko dito sa ating rehiyon,” Francisco said./PN
