DAVAO CITY — Environment Secretary Roy Cimatu gets 160 uniformed personnel of the Philippine National Police’s elite Special Action Force (SAF) to implement a strict lockdown in Cebu City areas hit by coronavirus pandemic.
Cimatu who was handpicked by President Rodrigo Duterte to oversee the implementation of health protocol in the said city told reporters, the SAF personnel is coming to help enforce the stringent protocols in areas where total lockdown in enforced.
Cimatu told reporters on Thursday that the SAF will help to strictly implement city-wide the enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) down to the barangays.
“What we have now are just the local PNP that are available. That’s why we asked for additional personnel. It’s because ECQ is not being observed well. The people don’t understand that the ECQ is really a total lockdown,” he said in Filipino during a press briefing at the Central Command.
As it is now, Cebu has over 200 personnel enforcing the lockdown but Cimatu said, there is a need to further implement the stringent measures.
Cimatu met with officials of Cebu’s Inter-Agency Task Force handling the Covid-19 pandemic. He described the Cebu situation similar to that of the National Capital Region.
He also asked the regional and city Health Departments to harmonize their daily figures of patients infected with the Covid-19.
“The figures are different. They are not harmonized. So that we will know the entire picture on the pandemic in Cebu City, based on actual figures,” he said.
Mayor Edgardo Labella said the city government is ready for the total lockdown that the national government will impose in the city.
Labella earlier said the City Hall is working out the release of Php500 million that will be used for aid distribution during the second ECQ until June 30.-Newsline
