THE Cebu City Police Office (CCPO) is preparing for the visit of President Rodrigo Duterte, who will attend the political rally of his candidates at the Plaza Independencia in Cebu City on Sunday night, Feb. 24.
The police will be on full alert starting Friday, Feb. 22.
CCPO Director Royina Garma said they did not have to wait for Camp Crame to order them to raise the alert status.
She said it was part of their protocol to automatically raise the alert level if the President was scheduled to visit
The declaration of full alert status means the cancellation of police officers’ vacation leaves.
CCPO personnel started preparing the security plan for the President’s visit last Monday, Feb. 18, yet.
The Police Regional Office 7 will deploy its personnel to augment the CCPO force.
Garma has coordinated with Secretary Michael Dino of the Office of the Presidential Assistant for the Visayas (Opav) for additional information on Duterte’s itinerary.
The Presidential Security Group will also help police securing the venue from protesters.
Duterte is expected to lead the biggest political rally in Cebu on Feb. 24, with 120,000 to 150,000 people expected to attend.
According to Opav spokesman Titus Borromeo, the rally, which will start at 2 p.m., is officially dubbed as the PDP-Laban Cebu Campaign Rally
“Considering his hectic schedule, this might be Duterte’s only campaign sortie in Cebu. We are preparing for about 120,000 in rally attendance, but our contingency is 150,000 people,” Borromeo said.
The event will be a gathering of all PDP-Laban candidates in Cebu City and Cebu Province, from governor down to the last councilor, congressional hopefuls and allied party-lists.
“We will leave to the President’s discretion whether he will endorse local PDP-Laban candidates or not,” Borromeo said.
Meanwhile, Borromeo said security measures would be strict at the rally because of the President’s presence.
Bottled water, pens, pencils and flying drones will not be allowed at the event.
“We will clarify if members of the media are exempted from carrying pens and pencils... depending on what will happen during the rally,” Borromeo said. (From AYB of SuperBalita Cebu, KAL, EOB)