BALER, Aurora — As far as Sen. Edgardo Angara is concerned, there is nothing wrong with requiring people to secure their cedulas (community tax certificates) as long as no oppression is involved.
“(Requiring people to secure cedulas) will increase the revenue of the town offices. However, it is wrong when the practice is oppressive,” he said.
Angara, here for the capital town’s founding anniversary celebration yesterday, addressed the locals’ apprehensions after government troops expanded their cedula drive to barangays here and in Ma. Aurora town.
Residents of certain villages in Nueva Ecija, Nueva Vizcaya and Pampanga earlier got a taste of the military’s cedula requirement, triggering a mad rush to secure the document.
Militant groups claimed that soldiers had committed abuses in doing so. But Armed Forces officials dismissed the allegations as mere propaganda of the government’s “enemies.”
Aurora Gov. Bellaflor Angara-Castillo admitted that the military has, indeed, required villagers in a number of towns in the province to show their cedulas.
“There are military personnel going to barangays just to see these cedulas,” she told reporters.
Angara, however, refused to comment on the political implication of the military’s cedula campaign.
Hundreds of Baler folk rushed to the municipal hall Friday to secure cedulas after getting reports that soldiers had swooped down on households in Ma. Aurora town.
To accommodate the crowd, municipal employees set up tables in a basketball court where activities marking the town’s fiesta were held earlier in the day.
In Ma. Aurora, some 10 kilometers from this capital town, residents, including students as young as 13, have been lining up at the town hall as early as 6 a.m. to secure cedulas.
