Borongan mayor backs anti-terror bill
That’s the reason why I am speaking now. We cannot wait for another killing to happen to speak out. We have learned our lessons
TACLOBAN CITY — With the twin ambush last year that killed at least eight people and injured over a dozen individuals including civilians still fresh in the minds of his constituents, Borongan City Mayor Jose Ivan Agda said he is throwing in his full support for the immediate enactment of the Anti-Terrorism Bill 2020 into a law.
During the 122nd anniversary of the proclamation of the country’s independence, Agda said the passage of the proposed bill will give justice to the death of civilians and government personnel who were victims of terror acts by the communist New People’s Army (NPA).
Agda said the “barbaric” act committed by the rebels in his city should not happen again.
“That’s the reason why I am speaking now. We cannot wait for another killing to happen to speak out. We have learned our lessons,” he said.
Last year, Borongan City was pushed to limelight due to two bombing and ambush incidents in the last quarter of the year.
On 13 December 2019, a police officer and an elderly woman were killed on the spot when NPA detonated a landmine meant for a passing police patrol car along the national highway. Four other policemen and 12 civilians, including three minors, who were on board the tailing vehicles were wounded.
The number of casualties eventually increased when a local government employee of Taft, Eastern Samar died hours later while being transported in an ambulance due to severe injury, while a woman died due to head injuries a week later.
On 11 November 2019, six soldiers died while 20 others were critically injured after the NPA detonated a landmine and staged an ambush in a remote village in Borongan.
These twin incidents rocked the otherwise peaceful city life in Eastern Samar’s provincial capital.
Agda said his support for the passage of the anti-terrorism bill into law should serve as a “reminder that the rule of law, and not any act of terrorism, should always prevail.”
He added that any law-abiding citizen should have nothing to fear with this law as it has safety measures against abuse on civil liberties.
“We need a law to protect the civilians from the atrocities of these terrorist groups,” he said.
The bill seeks to impose life imprisonment without parole on those who will participate in the planning, training, preparation, and facilitation of a terrorist act; possess objects connected with the preparation for the commission of terrorism; or collect or make documents connected with the preparation of terrorism.
It also imposes a 12-year imprisonment to any person who will threaten to commit terrorism and those who will propose any terroristic acts or incite others to commit terrorism.