BY RUBY SILUBRICO and PRINCE GOLEZ
BORACAY – Sen. Francis Pangilinan questioned the deployment of over 600 government troops to popular island resort Boracay in Malay, Aklan.
“Boracay is a tourist destination with a long coastline of soft, white sand beach. It is not a conflict area or a war zone,” said Pangilinan.
Director General Oscar Albayalde of the Philippine National Police (PNP) justified the presence of his men in Boracay.
“Kasi mahirap na masingitan tayo at ‘yan ang hindi ko gusto,” said Albayalde who flew to the island on Thursday to check his policemen.
Pangilinan said there are no terrorists or invaders in Boracay.
“It is a shame that the administration is deploying the military, police and the coastguard in Boracay while China has been blatantly trespassing in our territory and disrespecting our sovereignty (in the Spratly group of islands),” he added.
But according to Albayalde, no one should underestimate the situation in Boracay.
“If we need more police officers to secure the island, we will deploy more,” said the unapologetic PNP chief.
The Police Regional Office (PRO-6) deployed 630 police officers – in full battle gear – to Boracay a week before the island was closed on April 26 for a six-month rehabilitation.
Assisting them were some 200 soldiers and coastguards.
Of the 630 cops, 138 are newly trained on Civil Disturbance Management (CDM).
“We are actually protecting the lives of the people in Boracay that’s why we are maximizing our deployment,” said Albayalde.
Pangilinan would have none of it. The closure of Boracay without a clear plan for 36,000 displaced workers is “the only threat to the island and its residents,” he said.
“It is ironic that the government can express so much love to China’s President Xi Jin Ping but can’t be bothered to provide jobs for the displaced Boracay workers,” said Pangilinan.
Albayalde insisted there is no “overkill” in troop deployment to Boracay.
“Baka hindi lang sanay ang mga tao dito na makita ang napakaraming pulis at members of CDM,” he said.
Malacañang has opted to say little for now about China’s recent activities in the South China Sea, including its erection of a monument on Kagitingan Reef and landing military planes on Panganiban reef within the Philippines’ territory in the strategic waterway.
Panganiban Reef is internationally known as Mischief Reef, which the United Nations-backed Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague ruled in July 2016 was within the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and part of the country’s continental shelf.
China claims nearly all of the 3.5-million square kilometer South China Sea, but the arbitral court in The Hague, ruling in the challenge brought by the Philippines, declared Beijing’s claim invalid and pronounced it in violation of Manila’s sovereign right to fish and explore for resources in waters within its EEZ.
China, however, has ignored the ruling and proceeded to build artificial islands on reefs claimed by its rivals in the Spratly archipelago ./PN
