Governor Gwendolyn Garcia has ordered the return of barangay control points and strict border controls between Cebu City. | Raul Tabanao
CEBU CITY, Philippines — The Capitol has ordered the barangays in Cebu province to set up anew their border control points alongside the reinstitution of strict border controls with Cebu City effective midnight of Friday, June 26, 2020.
Governor Gwendolyn Garcia, in a memorandum, required barangay captains to set up the control points “to limit the entry of persons” into their barangays.
Garcia added that the re-institution of the barangay control points came after her meeting with Police Colonel Roderick Mariano, Cebu Police Provincial Office (CPPO) director.
She said that the measure would be essential in case unauthorized persons from Cebu City would be able to get past the border control checkpoints in the province’s borders in Mandaue City and Consolacion in the north, Talisay City in the south, and Balamban town in the west.
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The governor said that the border control points in the barangays had been effective in the implementation of strict mobility restrictions when the province was under enhanced community quarantine from last March 30 until May 20.
Earlier this June, Garcia ordered all border checkpoints in the barangays to be scrapped after a repatriated overseas worker was allegedly harassed in a sitio control point in a barangay in Catmon town, northern Cebu.
With the reimplementation of the barangay border controls, Garcia said only residents, OFWs and LSIs with complete documents, and persons authorized by policies of the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) and the Capitol would be allowed to enter or transit through the barangays in the province.
As returning OFWs may be subject to the health protocols of the receiving local government units, including a quarantine period, the memorandum says the OFW “shall only be quarantined at his or her residence.“
“The Philippine National Police and the Armed Forces of the Philippines are enjoined to assist the LGUs in the implementation of this Memorandum,” the memorandum read./dbs