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By Jeannette
I. Andrade, Reporter
Interior and
Local Government Secretary Ronaldo Puno ordered a legal study on the
searching of nightclub patrons for firearms as part of the election
gun ban.
“Firearms
may be sneaked into places like nightspots so we want to check not
only persons entering these establishments but also those leaving
these places,” Puno said.
He directed
the Philippine National Police to sustain the setting up of
checkpoints and surprise inspections to ensure that the prohibition
by the Com-mission on Elections on the unauthorized carrying of
firearms “is enforced to the fullest.”
But Puno
appealed to the public to help in the campaign by reporting
violators.
For the
election period from January 14 to June 13, only uniformed police
officers and civilians exempted by the Comelec can carry firearms.
PNP records
reveal that since the start of the election period, police units
nationwide have seized a total of 493 low-powered and high-powered
firearms as part of its campaign to collect loose guns and
neutralize partisan armed groups.
The Police
Regional Office 4-A in Calabarzon has confiscated the biggest number
of loose firearms with 113, with Metro Manila a close second with
88.
The Eastern
Visayas police has seized 37 firearms, while in Central Visayas, 32
loose guns were confiscated. Some 31 guns were each seized in
Northern Mindanao and Southern Mindanao.
In the
Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, which has the biggest number
of private armies, 26 guns were seized. In Central Mindanao, police
seized 21 firearms.
Here is a
breakdown of the number of guns seized in the other regions:
• 20 in the
Ilocos region
• 16 in the
Bicol region
• 14 each in
Caraga and Eastern Visayas
• 11 each in
the Cordillera Administrative Region and Cagayan Valley
• 10 in
Central Luzon
• 3 in
Mindoro, Marinduque, Romblon and Palawan.
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