CALAPAN CITY, Oriental Mindoro – The National Intelligence Coordinating Agency Region 4-B (Mimaropa or Oriental Mindoro, Occidental Mindoro, Marinduque, Romblon, and Palawan area) reported on Friday, Jan. 20, that 29 New People’s Army rebels have surrendered in Bongabong, Oriental Mindoro and took their oath of allegiance with the government.

Ariel T. Perlado, NICA Region 4-B chief, said their surrender was made possible through the painstaking efforts of his intelligence operatives who spent months locating them in the hinterlands of Oriental Mindoro.

The surrenderers were presented to Bongabong Mayor Elegio A. Malaluan who pledged to donate a five-hectare land in Sitio Hamindang, a known communist lair, in Barangay Hagan, Bongabong.

Malaluan said the property will be given to them with individual land titles.

He told the surrenderers that their produce such as ginger, banana, and other root crops will be traded as priority products during special market days at the town trade center.

Perlado said their surrender only showed that the government is on the right track in implementing the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC), a government strategy in addressing the root causes of insurgency and ending the communist rebellion in the country with a view of attaining an inclusive and sustainable peace.