Soldiers hold war games in Davao Oriental after insurgency-free declaration

DAVAO ORIENTAL, Philippines – Government forces on Friday, October 21, fired artillery shells in a Davao Oriental town where soldiers and New People’s Army (NPA) rebels clashed in September, but military officials said the bombardments were merely part of war exercises.

The military exercises took place in the village of Maputi, Banaybanay, more than a week after the Regional Peace and Order Council declared the whole of Davao Region communist insurgency-free based on the military’s claims.

But the declaration didn’t necessarily mean NPA rebel-free, Brigadier General Oliver Maquiling, the commander of the Army’s 701st Brigade, said on Saturday, October 22.

“There are still remnants (of the NPA) even though the whole Davao Region was already declared insurgency-free,” he said. 

Maquiling said the military was anticipating that NPA would attempt to stage a comeback in the Davao Region via the Caraga Region where the military identified recovery areas for the Communist Party of the Philippines’ military arm.

He said the NPA would try to recover in the Caraga provinces of Agusan and Surigao and then attempt to reclaim its lost territories in the Davao Region.

“We expect them to make efforts to recover these areas, and so, we are not lowering our guard down,” Maquiling said.

Experience, he said, taught the military that the communist rebels managed to take back areas earlier declared to be insurgency-free the moment the military pulled out its troops from these places.

Karen Deloso, the provincial government’s information officer, said some Davao Oriental officials were worried that the military would pull out its troops in the province and elsewhere in the region after the declaration.

“We hope they would stay here and sustain the gains of our peace and development efforts,” said Deloso.

Some 150 Army soldiers were sent to Banaybanay on Friday for the war games – a move that made people edgy again just like in September, when government and rebel forces exchanged firepower in the town.

But the military quickly allayed the fears of residents and explained that the troop deployment and artillery fire were merely a “normal military exercise” that takes place yearly.

The military exercise was also meant to “test the combat readiness of our field artillery units,” Maquiling said.

Soldiers also tested several 105 mm howitzers, which were donated to the government by the United States.

The World War II-era howitzers are old, long-range weapons capable of striking targets at a 12-kilometer distance. – Rappler.com