More than 2,000 people have been arrested for violating the election gun ban, the Philippine National Police said Friday.
Police Col. Bernard Banac, PNP spokesman, said as of 6 a.m. Thursday some 2,075 people had been arrested in 231,865 police operations since the implementation of the gun ban being imposed by the Commission on Elections since Jan. 13.
Of that number, 1,130 were arrested during police patrol operations, 369 through search warrants and 354 during the “Oplan Bakal, Sita, Galugad” operation.
Banac said the total figure included 199 people arrested in checkpoints and 23 others arrested during the serving of warrants of arrest since the gun ban started.
He said 1,962 of those arrested were civilians, 41 were security guards, 27 were government and elected officials, 22 were police officers, three were from the military, five were law enforcers and one was a member of the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology.
The authorities have also arrested nine people from “threat groups” and two from private armed groups.
Banac said the PNP had so far confiscated 1,692 firearms and 13,699 deadly weapons, grenades and other explosives, firearm replicas, bladed or pointed weapons and ammunition.
The midterm elections will be held on May 13 but the gun ban will last until June 12, according to the Comelec.