Police Lieutenant Colonel Janette Rafter, Deputy Director for Operations of the Cebu City Police Office (CCPO), told reporters that the first day of the campaign period in Cebu City was generally peaceful. | Emmariel Ares
CEBU CITY, Philippines – The official start of the ten-day campaign for the Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan Elections (BSKE) in Cebu City was “peaceful and successful.”
Police Lieutenant Colonel Janette Rafter, deputy director for operations of the Cebu City Police Office (CCPO), said they did not record any untoward incidents from the city’s 80 barangays on Thursday, October 19.
She said there were gatherings of a huge crowd of supporters as the candidates and their followers became excited that they were finally able to start their campaign.
“The first day of the ten-day campaign period was really very successful and peaceful. Although, as I’ve said, medyo naay mga barangay nga nabibo. Murag nabibo sila tungod sa paglaunch sa mga campaign strategy sa atong mga kanya-kanyang kandidato puhon sa BSKE 2023 karong October 30,” she said.
Motorcades
Rafter said that on Thursday, there were candidates who officially opened their campaign with a motorcade. But, the conduct of motorcades did not have much effect on vehicular traffic since most of these were done on barangay roads.
There were also those who started to already post their campaign materials.
“Naa silay mga gibuhat nga mga aktibidades sa ilang mga tagsa-tagsa ka mga barangay kung asa sila molunsad but it didn’t really affect in any way sa atong trapiko sa Sugbo,” she added.
The campaign period is scheduled from October 19 to 28.
Oplan Baklas
Meanwhile, Rafter said they will also be coordinating with Commission on Elections (Comelec) on the dates for the implementation of “Oplan Baklas” here.
CCPO will be joining “Oplan Baklas” to especially provide security.
“Ang atong PNP, we are just on the security of the team nga mag-conduct og Oplen Baklas puhon,” she said.
Police deployment
On October 30, Rafter said a total of 947 uniformed police personnel will be deployed to secure the conduct of the BSKE in the 71 polling places here.
“Out of the 1,221 nato nga mga personnel, uniformed personnel, there are 947 nga available for deployment,” she said.
At least 80 of 947 personnel will be deployed to augment security parts of Cebu province.
Rafter said that deployment will be based on the number of voters who are expected to crowd a particular voting area.
“Naa tay standard nga number of personnel for each polling places. But we are also preparing because ang atong mad police places diri is dako kaayo og butante,” she said.
As of this writing, Cebu City remains under the green category which means that there are no election areas of concern here.
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