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Monday, January 16, 2006
Crowd reaches 1M but police keeps order
By Jovy S. Taghoy & Mia E. Abellana
Sun.Star Staff Reporters
Police had to contend with at least one million spectators in the streets and in the grandstand, a brief skirmish between warring fraternities, cases of lost children and crowd control woes.
Despite these, they said yesterday’s Sinulog grand parade was generally peaceful.
Acting Cebu City Police Director Melvin Gayotin, also Task Force Sinulog commander, said the brief drizzles that threatened to mar the parade did not prevent spectators, including local and foreign tourists, from filling the streets to get glimpses of performers.
Still, security wasn’t enough to control the crowd; the lanes got too narrow for the dancers.
As early as 9 a.m., Gayotin decided to send a reserve platoon to the New Imus Road. Order was later restored.
More security
The additional security did not include yet military personnel from the Central Command and civilian volunteer groups.
Gayotin said he was able to assure total security within the parade route, but not outside.
For his part, Senior Supt. Carmelo Valmoria, who was tasked to monitor Sinulog-related events, estimated the crowd in the streets and in the grandstand to reach about a million people.
Despite this observation, he said the feedback he got from the field was that there were fewer people this year compared to the previous celebration. Senior Supt. Lani-o Nerez, deputy regional director for operations and yesterday’s chief of the PNP Operation Center, said the crowd began to swell in the afternoon.
Just as the parade was about to end, a clash between rival fraternities Alpha Kappa Rho (Akrho) and Tau Gamma Phi occurred.
It was not, however, determined who triggered the incident because both fraternities were pointing at each other.
Gayotin said two people, a boy and a woman, were injured in the incident.
A witness said it was a member of Tau Gamma who first threw a bottle of mineral water but another witness claimed an Akrho member started the incident.
The incident happened when Akrho members who joined the parade passed by a stage put up by members of Tau Gamma on Gen. Maxilom Ave. near Foodarama.
Gayotin said for the past Sinulog celebrations, both fraternities have been causing trouble.
Exclude them
He said he has long been recommending to the Sinulog Foundation for the exclusion of Akrho in the grand parade.
“They (Sinulog foundation) have the final call. It depends on the foundation, we could only recommend but they will have the final decision,” Gayotin said.
Nerez, for his part, said that if he had his way, the two groups will no longer be allowed to participate next year.
However, the pelting incident and unruly crowd was not the end to the police’s problems.
Fans of the hit reality series Pinoy Big Brother ignored soldiers tasked to control the crowd and ran towards the float where the popular “housemates” were riding.
Spectators stepped outside the cordon when persons on floats threw freebies. These included cologne, candies, hats, stickers and fans.
Seizure
Vice Mayor Michael Rama said he had to confiscate the items and told those distributing these to claim the items in his office.
Rama, chairman of the Sinulog Foundation, said he had to order one of the multicabs that went with one of the floats to get out of the parade route because they continued distributing their products.
Other than these problems, police also found five lost children. Their parents, though, were alerted through the broadcast media and the children were later claimed at the PNP assistance centers along the parade route.
Valmoria and Nerez were also introduced to new technology yesterday.
Dominion, which provides wireless Internet access, demonstrated how real-time videos could be viewed.
Hidden cameras were placed along the parade route while Nerez and Valmoria observed the pictures they saw.
Valmoria said the Police Regional Office (PRO) 7 was testing different technology from different companies to see if they could use this during the upcoming Asean summit in December.
For Bisaya stories from Cebu. Click here. (January 16, 2006 issue)
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