National Amnesty Program

Bohol joins 10,000 second

Chances to former rebels

TAGBILARAN CITY, Bohol (PIA)— With 191 former rebels now lining up hoping to get amnesty, Bohol authorities intend to contribute to the National Amnesty Commission’s (NAC) goal of providing 10,000 Second Chances to Filipinos who once strayed into the path of armed and bloody struggle.

“The NAC is accelerating its "10,000 Second Chances" campaign to process amnesty for former rebels,” Local Amnesty Board (LAB) head of the secretariat Charra Nicole Alinob shared at the recent Kapihan sa PIA, while urging more Boholanos who used to support the leftist extremists to come into the open and grab the chance to be freed from the criminal liabilities of helping the insurgents advance their extreme political beliefs.

Alinob said as of recent data, there are already some 9,455 amnesty applicants processed by the NAC.

Bohol Governor Erico Aristotle Aumentado, whose administration personally embarked on totally dismantling the insurgency through anti-poverty programs and provision of social services, has also opened dialogues and dangled irresistible integration programs to entice the former rebels who have lied low to officially come out where help awaits.

Take advantage of this rare offer, he said highlighting the government’s earnest offer to finally let peace settle here.

Intending to contribute to the count and bring more Boholano lives permanently out of the hassle of looking over their shoulders, while already living in peace, the governor adds, the LAB, housed inside the Provincial Community Development Office in the Capitol will be able to facilitate until March 13, the deadline for applications.

Installed by the National Amnesty Commission (NAC) as the 11th venue in the country where applications for amnesty can be processed, the Bohol LAB was launched in 2025 but was only operational in 2026, only after the operational budget requirements could be set in place, according to Ending Local Communist Armed Conflict (ELCAC) focal person of the Provincial Peace and Order Council (PPOC) Romeo Teruel.

With Bohol pioneering a program to wipe off insurgency through poverty alleviation programs, which in turn came out as among the most successful peace initiatives in the country, it was not a hard-sell for Bohol to ask the NAC to set up a LAB in Bohol, Teruel explained.

The program was so successful that then president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo then issued a Letter of Instruction urging local government units currently grappling with insurgency to follow the Bohol experience, Teruel, who has been steering the poverty program across administrations added.

We saw insurgency as a socio-economic and political problem that many people felt they were left behind in government projects and services that seeking the refuge in armed struggle was easy, according to Teruel.

While other areas saw insurgency with a purely military solution, Bohol charted a new way.

Teruel said “We changed our approach in addressing the problem, as poverty was one of the main causes of insurgency, so we launched poverty reduction programs.”

In 2002, Bohol saw the surrenders building up from a trickle to squads coming out, tired of the unfulfilled promise of the armed revolution.

What happens when former rebels surrender?

First, they get to undergo debriefings with the joint Armed Forces of the Philippine and Police Intelligence Committee to check on the veracity of their claims, match it with their order of battle list, and confirm the depth of their involvement in the underground.

Once the identity of the surrenderee is established, authorities check for pending cases filed against the surrenderees, so they could be lined up for amnesty grants or protected and helped if they had committed criminal offenses and could not be eligible for the amnesty.

As the present amnesty grant applies to those who surrendered after 2018, Bohol also crafted its own version of the government’s comprehensive local integration program, although with not as big as the benefits for those eligible for the national Enhanced Comprehensive Local Integration Program.

Bohol’s version in the Kauban sa Reporma Program is yet another first among LGUs adapting the national integration, Teruel pointed out.

With a deadline in barely two weeks, the LAB believes there are still some Boholanos who should be able to enlist for the amnesty program.

Alinob said the amnesty application deadline nears, although LAB would continue to process filed applications past the deadline, so that beating the deadline is imperative. (PIABohol)