Opposition calls for urgent action after Cumuto discovery, police station killing

Chair­man of the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment Mar­vin Gon­za­les has called for im­me­di­ate ac­tion fol­low­ing two in­ci­dents in­volv­ing a dis­cov­ery in Cu­mu­to and the killing of a po­lice of­fi­cer at a sta­tion.

In a state­ment, Gon­za­les said the coun­try was con­front­ed with the dis­cov­ery of a site in Cu­mu­to with re­ports of re­mains of more than 50 in­fants and sev­er­al adults, and the killing of a woman po­lice con­sta­ble in­side a po­lice sta­tion, along with re­ports of firearms and am­mu­ni­tion miss­ing.

Gon­za­les ex­tend­ed con­do­lences to the fam­i­ly and col­leagues of the of­fi­cer and to fam­i­lies af­fect­ed by the dis­cov­ery.

He said the in­ci­dents oc­curred dur­ing the State of Emer­gency and raised ques­tions about se­cu­ri­ty mea­sures and the pro­tec­tion of cit­i­zens.

Gon­za­les re­ferred to state­ments by Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro that the is­sue fac­ing the coun­try was fear of crime rather than crime it­self. He said the in­ci­dents show that crime re­mains a con­cern.

He called on Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar to con­vene a meet­ing of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil and to ad­dress the coun­try.

Gon­za­les al­so called for steps to lo­cate the miss­ing firearms and to iden­ti­fy those re­spon­si­ble.

He said the Gov­ern­ment should seek in­ter­na­tion­al as­sis­tance in tech­ni­cal, foren­sic and in­ves­tiga­tive ar­eas if need­ed.

Gon­za­les called for the re­moval of Min­is­ter of Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty pend­ing fur­ther de­vel­op­ments re­lat­ed to the in­ci­dents.

He al­so re­ferred to re­ports that some of the re­mains dis­cov­ered in Cu­mu­to may be linked to the North Cen­tral Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty. He said if con­firmed, the chair­man and board should be re­moved pend­ing an in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

Gon­za­les said cit­i­zens are seek­ing in­for­ma­tion on the re­sponse to the in­ci­dents and the steps be­ing tak­en by au­thor­i­ties.

He said the Op­po­si­tion is call­ing for ac­tion in­clud­ing a meet­ing of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil, a na­tion­al ad­dress, re­cov­ery of weapons, and in­ves­ti­ga­tions in­to both mat­ters.