Bacolod City topped the list of gun ban violators with 20, with Iloilo City ranking as second with 18, arrested as of yesterday, records of the Police Regional Office-6 show.

Negros Occidental followed with 12, Iloilo province with 11, Capiz and Aklan with 8, Antique with three and Guimaras with two.

The number of violators of the election gun ban rose to 79, seven of them are four security guards, a police officer, an army man and two barangay ‘tanods.’

The latest violator was an army man who was caught at a mall in Bacolod City with a .45 caliber pistol Friday last week.

Among the items recovered by the police were 54 firearms, 14 of them are high-powered, 20 bladed weapons, a hand grenade, and two gun/grenade replicas

Chief Superintendent Agrimero Cruz, Jr., director of Police Regional Office 6, said most of the arrests were made through police response, while other violators were nabbed through the help of concerned citizens.

Cruz stressed that under the Omnibus election code, gun replicas are also prohibited.

Except for the members of law enforcement agencies who performing their official functions and wearing their agency-prescribed uniforms, all person are prohibited from carrying guns, deadly weapons or their replicas during the election period, he said.

The election gun ban took effect on January 13 and will end on June 12.*APN

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