Comelec nod needed for poll duty – AFP

04/30/2007 | 04:05 PM

Amid directives from President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo to assist the police in preventing further election violence, the Armed Forces said Monday it cannot do so without prior clearance from the Commission on Elections.

In a news briefing, military information chief Lt. Col. Bartolome Bacarro said the AFP is bound by provisions of a memorandum of agreement the Defense department earlier entered into with the Comelec in October last year.

The agreement, which aims to insulate the military from partisan politics, stipulates that soldiers should not be tapped to perform poll-related duties except when there are serious armed threats.

Earlier in the day, President Arroyo called upon the military to assist the police in stemming the tide of election-related violence. The directive came hours after San Carlos City Mayor Julian Resuello succumbed while under treatment gunshot wounds at the St. Luke’s Medical Center in Quezon City.

Resuello was fired at Saturday evening while attending a fiesta in one of the city’s villages. One of his aides was also killed in the incident.

“The Armed Forces of the Philippines is ready (to assist the PNP). Actually, that’s what we have been preparing for…The Armed Forces of the Philippines is prepared to respond to any election related mandate that the Commission on Election will be providing us once we are deputized,” Bacarro said.

“So the bottom line is we are prepared to provide said assistance once we are deputized by the Commission on Election based on the recommendation of the Philippine National Police,” he added.

What the military can do for the meantime, Bacarro said, is to establish checkpoints in areas where election violence are to be expected.

“As a measure, the chief of staff (Gen. Hermogenes Esperon Jr) has directed the chief of operations (Maj. Gen. Jogy Fojas) to direct all units to increase the number of checkpoints that we are establishing,” Bacarro said without disclosing the exact location of the checkpoints to be established.

“There will be an increase in the checkpoints that we have to ensure that the implementation of the (election) gun ban. These checkpoints are will be ISO-related but of course it can in a way be a preemptive measure for groups that would be advocating the use of violence,” he added. – GMANews.TV