Thursday, June 19, 2025

Curfew lifted in NCR

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Metro mayors okay extended mall hours

BY JOCELYN MONTEMAYOR and NOEL TALACAY

THE 12 to 4 a.m. unified curfew hours in Metro Manila is lifted starting today, as malls and other commercial establishments in the region are allowed to extend their operating hours in anticipation of the wave of Christmas shoppers in the coming weeks, the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) said yesterday.

Benjamin “Benhur” Abalos Jr., MMDA chairman, said local government units in the National Capital Region (NCR) can still impose curfew hours for minors.

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“The Metro Manila mayors have agreed to lift the curfew hours in the metropolis,” Abalos said, adding: “But we will respect the implementation of curfew on minors based on existing ordinances of the respective LGUs.”

Abalos said the lifting of curfew hours in Metro Manila will “help spread out the influx of people coming to and from malls to further reduce the risk of virus transmission.”

The new regulation is contained in MMDA Resolution No. 21-25 which was issued by the Metro Manila Council, the governing and policy-making body of the 17 local government units of Metro Manila, on Wednesday.

Abalos said owners of malls and other commercial establishments in Metro Manila can extend their operating hours from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. on weekdays, and 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. on weekends, from November 15 to January 3. Mall operations can also be extended further to 12 midnight, the MMDA chief added.

Abalos said the owners have agreed to schedule their store deliveries from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. to avoid adding to the traffic and the crowd that would troop to the malls.
Mall sales will also be limited to Saturdays, Sundays and holidays.

To complement the extended mall operating hours of malls and other business establishments, the Inter-Agency Task Force on the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF) has agreed to increase to 70 percent the passenger capacity in public utility vehicles (PUVs) to accommodate more commuters.

Metro Manila is under Alert Level 3 until November 14. The status permits several establishments such as restaurants, gyms, cinemas and movie houses to operate at 30 percent indoor venue capacity for fully vaccinated individuals, and up to 50 percent for outdoor venue capacity for those who have yet to be inoculated.

All employees of the establishments are required to be fully vaccinated.

The PNP yesterday said 406 areas in 10 regions, including National Capital Region (NCR), are under granular lockdown, affecting 6,793 households or 29,701 individuals, as of Tuesday.

The locked down areas are situated in 270 barangays within 49 cities and municipalities.

The Cordillera Administrative Region has 133 areas under localized lockdown, followed by Mimaropa with 98, Ilocos Region with 49, Cagayan Valley with 46, and NCR with 43.

The PNP said Central Visayas has 13 areas under granular lockdown, while Bicol has 12, Zamboanga Peninsula has seven, Western Visayas has three, and Northern Mindanao has two.

While Bicol region only has 12 areas under granular lockdown, the mobility restriction affects 5,422 households composed of 25,705 individuals.

In NCR, there are 224 households under lockdown, affecting 791 individuals.

The granular lockdowns are manned by 324 policemen, 22 Bureau of Fire Protection personnel, and 538 force multipliers or local government personnel.

Meanwhile, the PNP said 865,148 quarantine violators were accosted throughout the country since October 16, of which 44,165 were caught last Tuesday.

Citing data as of Tuesday, the PNP said 687,804 were accosted for violation of minimum public health standards (MPHS), 141,633 for curfew violation and 35,711 were non-Authorized Persons Outside Residence or non-APORs.

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Of the violators, 694,782 (80 percent) were merely warned, 112,893 (13 percent) were fined and 57,473 (seven percent) were brought to police stations for filing of charges.
In NCR, there are 176,099 violators accosted during the same period, of which 9,822 were caught last Tuesday. The PNP said 132,931 of the violators were caught for MPHS violation, 42,268 for curfew violation, and 900 non-APORs.

It said 105,137 (60 percent) of the violators in Metro Manila were warned, 58,920 (33 percent) were fined and 12,042 (seven percent) were brought to the police stations for filing of charges.

Despite the reported slowdown in the decline in cases, Health Secretary Francisco Duque III yesterday remained confident that infections will drop below 2,000 as long as everyone do their part.

In a virtual media forum, Duque said the COVID-19 status in the country relies on the general public as much as it is with the authorities.

“If we continue to do this, with consistency and cadence, I think we will be able to bring it down to even below 2,000 cases a day,” said Duque, adding: “We were able to do the containment measure, and are successful, as reflected by the fact that cases are going down. (But) We have to have consistency.”

Duque reiterated he is in favor of the deescalation to Alert Level 2 in Metro Manila “provided that there is really a condition of strict compliance to minimum public health standards, avoidance of really large and crowded areas.”

The DOH on Tuesday reported that the decline in COVID-19 cases in the Philippines has started slowing down in recent days, which it warned could lead to another increase in cases.

House leaders led by Speaker Lord Allan Velasco backed the proposal to further ease COVID-19 restrictions in Metro Manila amid the steady decline in the number of new infections, saying this would result in the much-needed broader reopening of the economy.

“The government’s aggressive vaccination campaign has given us ample protection against a possible surge in COVID-19 cases. Around 80 percent of NCR residents have been fully vaccinated, and 96 percent have received their first dose. Given these data, we can confidently reopen as many businesses as possible and get our economy back on track,” Velasco said.

Velasco urged the IATF to check the effectivity or efficiency of each brand of vaccine to notify the people “when they need to get a booster.”

Deputy speaker Michael Romero said vaccination cards should be treated as passports of fully vaccinated individuals to enter business establishments where the “No vaccination card, No entry” policy can be implemented like what the United States and other countries are doing.

“With the NCR hitting over 80 percent of the target population now fully vaccinated, we need now to open our domestic economy to its full scale,” he said. “Back-to-normal life is now possible. This is exactly what the US is doing, and we should follow in order for our economy to gain traction.” — With Victor Reyes, Gerard Naval and Wendell Vigilia

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