CEBU CITY — Even criminals took some time off to watch Filipino boxing icon Manny Pacquiao slugging it out with Ghana native, Joshua Clottey last Sunday at the Dallas Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
Records at the Cebu City Mobile Patrol Division, the police unit that initially receives all calls for police assistance, showed not a single alarm or any form of criminality during the Pacquiao-Clottey fight.
Cebu City Police Office Directory Patrocino Comendador said he was expecting lesser incidents of crime during the fight last Sunday but a team of policemen was still deployed to conduct checkpoints on Sunday to avert any criminal activity in the city.
No arrests were made in the checkpoints and the hotline of the Mobile Patrol Division was quiet all through the 12-round Pacquiao-Clottey bout, said Comendador.
Negros Occidental province also reported zero-crime last Sunday as Negrenses were glued to television sets watching the Pacquiao-Clottey fight for the World Boxing Organization (WBO)’s welterweight championship.
Negros Occidental Police Provincial Office (NOPPO) Operations and Plans Branch chief, Police Inspector Jefferson Descallar, said that the usual preemptive measures that policemen in Negros Occidental undertook helped the PNP achieve such “zero” crime rate.
All Philippine National Police (PNP) stations in the province including the Negros Occidental Provincial Public Safety Management Company were placed on full alert to thwart any possible attacks from dissident terrorists as well as from other lawless elements that might take advantage of the situation, added Descallar.
At the PNP provincial headquarters in Camp Alfredo Montelibano in Barangay Estefania, Bacolod City, policemen were on full alert even as NOPPO Director, Police Sr. Supt. Manuel Felix provided a live view of the match for policemen and their families at the camp’s Administration building.
The free pay-per-view boxing fight via satellite was provided by Felix to all PNP personnel who watched the Pacquiao-Clottey match. (With a report from PNA)
