ILOILO City – The Communist Party of the Philippines – New People’s Army (CPP-NPA) has lost control of the barangays in Panay Island where they used to have sympathizers, according to the Philippine Army.
“We hit them hard on the battle of perception and at the level of combat operations,” said Captain Kim Apitong, officer-in-charge of the 3rd Infantry Division’s (3ID) Public Affairs Office.
The lack of mass actions in Panay Island each time the CPP-NPA has an event such as their anniversary indicates that they have become insignificant, he pointed out.
“We have already cleared the barangays. However, there are some sitios (zones) where rebels continue to threaten residents,” said Apitong.
Panay Island is composed of 3,291 barangays spread in the provinces of Iloilo, Antique, Aklan, and Capiz.
Apitong lauded barangay residents for providing the Army with relevant information, resulting to successful anti-insurgency operations.
Just this January, seven rebels surrendered to the 3ID. They were members of the Southern and Central Fronts of the Komiteng Rehiyonal-Panay, according to Army Brigadier General Marion Sison of the 301st Brigade.
The surrenderees also turned over to the Army one M16 rifle, an improvised shotgun, a .45 pistol; a homemade M79 grenade launcher, and four 40MM cartridges.
According to Sison, around 145 rebels are left in Panay’s mountains. He expressed confidence that “malaki ang effect ng pag-surrender…namulat sila na nawala silang mapala sa kanilang pakikibaka.”
“Those who are still in the mountains we encourage to surrender because there are lots of government reintegration programs,” said Sison.
With two of their top leaders neutralized by government troops in 2021, the rebels are no longer a significant force in Panay, declared Apitong.
“Neutralized” means the rebels either died in battle, surrendered or got captured, he explained.
Apitong identified the two neutralized leaders as Joven Ceralvo alias Lex, commanding officer of the Front Operational Command and deputy secretary of the Southern Front, Komiteng Rehiyonal Panay; and Reynaldo Bocala alias Russ/Bading, chief regional finance bureau of Komiteng Rehiyon-Panay.
“We hit them directly. We targeted them in such a way that they were surprised,” said Apitong.
Ceralvo was among those killed in the Dec. 1, 2021 operation of Army troops in the NPA hideout in Sitio Burak, Barangay Alimodias, Miag-ao, Iloilo.
Bocala, on the other hand, died in a shootout with government troops on May 28, 2021 in Pavia, Iloilo.
Apitong said the Dec. 1, 2021 operation was a big blow to the CPP-NPA. Aside from Ceralvo, eight other NPA rebels were killed.
The 3ID’s various units, he said, neutralized last year a total of rebels in Western and Central Visayas – 71 surrendered, 49 died in clashes, and 22 were apprehended.
The CPP-NPA is listed as a terrorist organization by the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the Philippines.
The Anti-Terrorism Council also formally designated the National Democratic Front as a terrorist organization on June 23, 2021, citing it as “an integral and inseparable part” of the CPP-NPA that was created in April 1973. (With a report from the Philippine News Agency/PN)
