Josephine Leysa, director of the Department of the Interior and Local Government-Region 12 (File photo courtesy of DILG-12)
GENERAL SANTOS CITY – Local government units (LGUs) in Region 12 (Soccsksargen) are seeking the temporary suspension of inbound commercial flights at the city international airport in the wake of the continuing surge of coronavirus diseases 2019 (Covid-19) cases in the National Capital Region (NCR) and other areas, an official said.
Josephine Leysa, Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG)-Region 12 director, said in a statement the LGUs requested the move as the NCR and its neighboring localities remained under heightened community quarantine on Monday.
She said the proposed flight suspension will continue for at least two weeks after the lifting of the strict quarantine measures in the affected areas.
Leysa said the Soccksargen Regional Inter-Agency Task Force (RIATF) and Regional Task Force (RTF) against Covid-19 endorsed the request last week to the National IATF for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases for approval.
The city international airport has been serving flights from Manila, Clark Cebu and Iloilo by the Philippine Airlines, Cebu Pacific and Air Asia.
The inbound flights were suspended for several months last year due to Covid-19 but have started to increase in the past months.
NCR and the provinces of Bulacan, Rizal, Laguna and Cavite were placed under enhanced community quarantine from April 4 to 11 due to the rising Covid-19 cases.
The ECQ in NCR Plus was lifted on Sunday night but the area will remain under modified ECQ for another week.
Aside from the flight suspension, Leysa said the RIATF and RTF also endorsed several resolutions to the NIATF “to address various concerns on Covid-19 actions at the regional level".
She said they requested the NIATF to approve the request of concerned LGUs to impose mandatory seven-day quarantine for all returning residents and visitors to Region 12 regardless of their points of origin.
The request was earlier made by the provincial government of South Cotabato as a precautionary measure against the rising Covid-19 cases, especially of its mutant strains or variants.
The city government had also sought approval for the imposition of quarantine for travelers and returning residents, especially those coming from countries or areas with confirmed cases of the disease variants.
Leysa said they approved a resolution requesting national government agencies with health personnel to assist the ongoing rollout of the Covid-19 vaccines in the region.
She said LGUs were enjoined to spearhead more aggressive and consistent information and education campaign strategies on Covid-19 vaccination.
“(This is) to generate public awareness and support to the national covernment's vaccination program,” she said in a statement.
The RIATF and RTF enjoined all business establishments in the region to consistently implement the minimum health standards and continuously remind their clients to observe them through public address systems.
LGUs in the region were also asked to adopt and implement the “Safe, Swift, and Smart Passage” (S-PASS) system developed by the Department of Science and Technology.
A project briefer said S-PaSS is an innovative travel management system for local travelers who are returning to or visiting different localities in time for the holidays, for vacation or for business.
It can facilitate local travel where the public can access information on travel restrictions implemented by different LGUs in line with the pandemic, it added.(PNA)
