The military will deploy over 40,000 personnel across the country for the May 9 elections, Armed Forces spokesman Col. Ramon Zagala said Sunday,
“We have added troops in all our area commands. The numbers just vary depending on their need. All our available troops will be made available for them. If necessary, more can be added,” Zagala said.
Zagala, however, said the military will remain non-partisan to protect their integrity and the public’s trust, especially as they will also coordinate with the Commission on Elections to transport poll paraphernalia on May 9.
“No member of the AFP can directly or indirectly engage in any partisan political activity. Our only constitutional right is to vote,” he said.
The Philippine National police earlier said it will be fielding at least 40,000 cops nationwide, or almost 20 percent of its total force.
“For our transportation equipment for our ground vehicles all over the PNP, we have 15,000 deployable transportation equipment to include 239 watercraft and aircraft such as the H125 and R44,” said Maj. Gen. Ronaldo Olay, PNP Directorate for Logistics director.
“These logistical equipment are already deployed and they are actually now being used to escort, provide security to the movement of our automated election system and the official ballots from the hub of the Comelec to the different regional and provincial hubs,” Olay added.
The Comelec has placed 105 municipalities and 14 cities under its “red category” for possible election-related violence.
“We are monitoring these areas. If violence erupts that threatens peace during elections, we might be constrained to declare these areas under Comelec control,” Comelec chairperson Saidamen Pangarungan said.
The Comelec election hotspot list has four categories – green, yellow, orange, and red.
Green refers to areas that do not have security concerns and are generally peaceful and orderly, while yellow are areas of concern, which means that these have a history of election-related incidents in the last elections, possible employment of partisan armed groups, the occurrence of politically motivated election-related incidents and had been previously declared under Comelec control.
Orange, on the other hand, means areas of immediate concern where there is a serious armed threat; while Red means areas of grave concern, which exhibit combined factors under the Yellow category with serious armed threats that may warrant the motu proprio (on its own) declaration of Comelec control.
From Jan. 9 to April 17, the PNP said it has recorded 28 election-related incidents.