CBCP | PHOTO: Wikimedia Commons
MANILA, Philippines — The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) has now representatives in the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-Elcac), according to Executive Director Usec. Ernesto Torres on Thursday.
The NTF-Elcac had reorganized and expanded the taskforce, with hopes of having a more holistic approach to ending local insurgency.
Torres explained that there are two private representatives in the NTF-Elcac, one would be from the religious sector and one from the business sector.
“When we first approached the CBCP leadership, we were accepted warmly. We did not have a problem with them, in fact, they already accepted to cooperate with us because we were able to explain to them, about the program of the government,” Torres said in a mix of English and Filipino during a Palace briefing.
According to Torres, the representative from the CBCP will be Bishop Reynaldo Evangelista with Father Jerome Secillano as his alternate.
“We are a very religious country, so if I’m not mistaken, more than 80 percent of our population is Catholic or Christian, so the organization could be felt down to the barangays and even sitios. So they are organized as such, so with them on our side, it would be a lot easier for us to disseminate, to cascade the information, the good news of the government to those living in far flung areas,” he said.
Other agencies that joined the NTF-Elcac’s executive committee are the following: Department of Information and Communications Technology, Department of Labor and Employment, Department of Transportation, Department of Tourism, Department of Energy, Department of Trade and Industry, Department of Human Settlements and Urban Development, Department of Foreign Affairs, Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Department of Health, Department of Migrant Workers.
This brings the total number of government agencies in the NTF-Elcac to 32.