Antique province has established its Provincial Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (PTF-ELCAC) on Thursday, an official of the Philippine Army said.

The PTF-ELCAC was created through an Executive Order and joint resolution passed during the Sept. 26 joint meeting of the Antique Peace and Order Council (PPOC), Peace Development Council (PDC) and Provincial Anti-Drug Abuse Council at the Provincial Capitol Building in San Jose de Buenavista town.

Antique Governor Rhodora Cadiao led the signing of Executive Order No. 119 creating the Antique PTF-ELCAC.

Lt. Col. Joel Benedict Batara, commander of the Philippine Army’s 61st Infantry Battalion (61IB), lauded Antique for being the first province in Panay to create the PTF-ELCAC.

“The national task force is headed by the President, and it will be cascaded to provinces, to municipalities and villages,” he said.

Batara noted that the task force is joined by the council concerned with security and development “to harmonize programs of peace and order with development”.

“One of the priorities (of the task force) is here on the conflict and vulnerable areas to address insurgency. This is part of the whole-of-nation approach since the problem on insurgency is not only the concern of the Armed Forces of the Philippines alone,” he said.

Although Antique was already declared “peaceful and ready for development” in 2015, Batara noted the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army (CPP-NPA) has “recovery efforts” in some of Antique’s towns.

He said Antique is the go-to province of rebels when the government troops conduct operations in neighboring Iloilo province.

“They (rebels) have recovery efforts in towns of Culasi, Valderrama, San Remigio, Sibalom, and Hamtic. This will be the focus of the task force, to clear these areas, so that the rebels will not succeed in their recovery efforts,” Batara said.

With the creation of the task force, a series of workshops to end local insurgency will be held in the provincial level. Also, specific tasks will be identified and implementation plans will be crafted.

Batara said the task force will also work towards the declaration of the CPP-NPA as persona-non-grata in the province.

“That will be included in the program,” he said.

The towns of Anini-y, Belison, Libertad, Culasi, San Jose de Buenavista and Lauan have earlier passed a resolution condemning the terroristic activities of the CPP-NPA and declaring them unwelcome in their respective localities.

Batara urged the leaders of Antique province to continue their efforts towards peace, security and development and said he expects other provinces to also establish the same task force on ending local insurgency.PNA