Chief Supt. Debold Sinas (CDN ONLINE FILE PHOTO)
CEBU CITY, Philippines — Cellphone signals will be jammed along the routes of the solemn procession and the Sinulog Grand Mardi Gras.
Chief Superintendent Debold Sinas, Police Regional Office in Central Visayas (PRO-7) director, said during the New Year’s Call of all police chiefs in Central Visayas at the Camp Sergio Osmeña, on Friday morning, January 4, that he was confident that the cellular phone signals would definitely be cut or jammed in certain areas in Cebu City from January 19 to 20.
Sinas said that the PRO-7 was in the final negotiations with the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) for the sectoral jamming of the cellular phone signals along the routes of the solemn procession and the Grand Mardi Gras.
“We are waiting for their (NTC) approval and we are continuously doing follow-ups on our requests,” said Sinas during the New Year’s Call of all police chiefs in Central Visayas at the Camp Sergio Osmeña, on Friday morning, January 4.
Sinas assured that the signal will only be jammed during the duration of the activities, the times of which are still to be determined.
The areas that may lose signal during the Sinulog festival includes the Cebu City Sports Complex, the Fuente Osmeña Circle, Osmeña Boulevard, General Maxilom Avenue, M.J. Cuenco Avenue, Imus Avenue, and P. Del Rosario Street.
“This is not the first time that a signal jam will be done during Sinulog. Dapat prepared namo unsay buhaton. (You should be prepared what to do),” said Sinas.
Signal jamming has also been implemented during the Sinulog 2017 and 2018.
Sinas said that groups of people going together should agree on a rendezvous point and a time to meet if they would like to go their separate ways for a while during the festivities especially with the huge crowd expected along the routes of the solemn procession and the mardi gras.
The PRO-7 director assured that despite the signal jam, police forces would not have a problem communicating with each other.
“We have enough radio transceivers for the personnel. The radio waves don’t get affected by the signal jam,” he said.
However, Sinas warned that if the Cebu City government would push through with installing Wi-Fi along the Sinulog route, then this might be affected by the signal jam./dbs