Mayor Sara Duterte said that she will still pursue the local peace talks with the New People’s Army despite the recent burning incident and Improvised Explosive Device (IED) explosion that injured a fish vendor.
Mayor Duterte said that she will still welcome the NPA if they decide to talk about peace in the coming days.
The mayor said that she will not change her position of peace towards the rebel, however she consider them as a terrorist because of what happened.
“The local Government of Davao City is always open because we believe that discussion and talks will be the solution, but it really depends on the members of the NPA,” she said.
Mayor Duterte said that even the job that she offered to the reds will always remain as long as they decide to talk to the government peacefully and leave the armed group.
She though clarified that despite her offer of peaceful resolution towards the rebels, as a mayor of Davao City, she will always support the security forces’ operations against them.
“We are always open, but of course with what happened we also support operations against them,” she said.
“There will be no pause on the operations against NPA in Davao City, in fact the Police and Military will strengthen their operations against them,” she added.
On Saturday morning, the NPA torched the Lorenzo owned box plant of Lapanday Food Corporation located in Mandug this City. The rebels also raided the Lorenzo Ranch in Calinan and burned three trucks.
Davao City Police Office Director Sr. Supt Alexander Tagum said that based on their initial investigation, the cost of damaged of the burning incident in the box plant alone have an estimated cost of damaged of around P500 million.
Tagum said that the police will strengthen further the security offenses around the city and will also the defense of the industrial complex.
“We already discussed about the augmentations that we will ask from the regional office and also in the military,” he said.
