(Eagle News) — Over 1,000 local government units have declared members of the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army-National Democratic Front as persona non grata in their respective cities, municipalities, and provinces, the Department of the Interior and Local Government said on Friday, Dec. 11.
In a statement on Friday, December 11, Interior Secretary Eduardo Año said the 1546 of the 1715 total LGUs in the country passed resolutions declaring the same.
Of the 1,546, 64 were provinces, 110 were cities, and 1372 were municipalities.
He said at least 12,474 of the 42,046 barangays in the country have rejected the group members.
Año said the remaining LGUs were in “various stages of deliberation in their respective provincial, city, and municipal councils.”
He said six out of the 17 regions in the country have already reached a 100 percent declaration of persona non grata.
These were Central Luzon, Central Visayas, Zamboanga Peninsula, Mimaropa and the Cordillera Administrative Region.
In Metro Manila, nine LGUS – Caloocan, Las Piñas, Mandaluyong, Muntinlupa, Navotas, Pasig, Quezon, San Juan, and Valenzuela–have already passed resolutions, he said.
“Much like the battle against the COVID-19 pandemic, we need to finally end this very old problem using a whole-of-nation approach, and the support from our LGUs gives us great assurance that we are not alone in this war against these atheists, Maoists terrorists,” Año said, noting that the DILG was looking forward to more LGUs “join(ing) us in this fight against Communist terrorism.”
“We cannot allow these groups to continue killing people, the time has come to finally put an end to their wicked ways,” he added.