DAVAO City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio said the Davao City Peace Committee (DC-Peace) has recommended for a temporary ceasefire between the New People's Army (NPA) and government forces.
"I'll think about it, and maybe since it has been established in the past that there is a season of peace also because of the season of giving (and) forgiving, we will see," the mayor said on Monday, November 20, in an interview.
Duterte-Carpio reiterated that the declaration of a ceasefire won't be problematic on her end.
"It is not a problem for as long as they are sincere to talk, as long as we can see that they will make an effort to talk about peace in the city of Davao," she said.
Duterte-Carpio said the ceasefire is still in a form of recommendation from DC-Peace, which had no military component and she is still deciding whether to uphold the committee's recommendation.
"We will see if we can do that," she said.
Days of ceasefire may fall on December 25 (Christmas Day), December 26 (NPA anniversary), December 31 and January 1.
Duterte-Carpio said aside from the ceasefire, which she dubbed as "Days of peace during Christmas", the DC-Peace members will also go up to the hinterland parts of the city on December 7 to 9 for the localized peace talks.
She said the city will continue with the localized talks despite President Rodrigo Duterte's statements saying that he will issue a proclamation declaring members of New People's Army as terrorists.
Duterte-Carpio said the city will just wait for the official proclamation from the national government for the declaration.
The city, through the DC-Peace, will continue reaching out to the NPA on the peace talks.