Ex-NPA militiamen get livelihood assistance

By Glazyl Y. Masculino

 

BACOLOD City – Fifteen former militiamen of the New People’s Army (NPA) received livelihood assistance from the government in Zamboanguita, Negros Oriental yesterday.

The Army’s 11th Infantry Battalion (IB) in partnership with the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and Negros Oriental Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NOTF-ELCAC), led the turnover of livelihood assistance kits to the beneficiaries of the Enhanced Comprehensive Local Integration Program (E-CLIP).

DTI provincial director Nimfa Virtucio said the program aims to uplift and provide livelihood assistance to existing and aspiring entrepreneurs in areas hit by calamities, including areas covered by the government’s counter-insurgency program.

It is part of the livelihood seeding and entrepreneurship development project of the DTI dubbed “Pangkabuhayan sa pag Bangon at Ginhawa” or PBG.

The beneficiaries picked the livelihood kit they would like to avail, Virtucio said.

₱10,000 worth of livelihood kits was provided to those who would like to start a sari-sari store; cows were given to those who opted for cattle raising; and fertilizers and sugarcane seedlings to those who wish to engage in farming.

Lieutenant Colonel Ramir Redosendo, 11th IB commander, said the beneficiaries were from Barangay Calango and Mayabon who surrendered to the Army through the Community Support Program (CSP) activity.

They surrendered and wished to return to the folds of the law. Thus, we are helping them to start over, he said.

Redosendo said that more beneficiaries will be provided with assistance in the coming weeks in the towns of Sta. Catalina and Valencia.

Also present in the activity were Mayor Glenson Alanano, and Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (Tesda) provincial director Joel Villagracia.