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BY GLENDA SOLOGASTOA
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Friday, January 20, 2017
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ILOILO City – The Iloilo City Police Office (ICPO) did not discount the possibility that cell phone signals may be jammed for security purposes during tomorrow’s Kasadhayan cultural contest and Sunday’s ati-ati tribes competition of the Dinagyang Festival.
According to Senior Superintendent Remus Zacharias Canieso, his office informed various telecommunications companies on the possibility of being asked to jam cell phone signals should there be a need for it.
In several incidents in Mindanao, including the Davao City bombing in September last year, suspected terrorists detonated improvised explosive devices using cell phone signals.
The Iloilo Dinagyang Foundation, Inc., organizer of the annual festivity, also planned to write the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) about a possible cell phone signal jamming.
“In case there’s a security threat, we can use our request with the telecommunications companies,” said Canieso.
But Canieso emphasized the ICPO has not monitored any credible threat so far.
In recent years, spectators were observed to record Dinagyang events in their mobile phones and tablet computers and upload them right away in their social media accounts such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, among others. This needed cell phone signal.
“Let us pray nga safe kita tanan. Buloligan naton ini kay aton ini tanan. We offer this activity to Señor Santo Niño,” said Canieso.
In a recent interview, ICPO spokesperson Senior Inspector Shella Mae Sangrines said there was no plan to jam cell phone signals this Saturday and Sunday.
“Some sectors here may have expressed concern about it perhaps due to the recent Black Nazarene feast security measures in Manila. But no, we don’t even have the equipment to jam cell phone signals,” she added./PN
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