MANILA, Philippines – Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon on Monday stressed that the Philippine National Police (PNP) must step up its hiring process to further increase police visibility and deter crimes.
During the Senate hearing of the Department of the Interior and Local Government’s (DILG) 2020 budget, it was revealed that funds have been released to the PNP for the hiring of at least 10,000 police officers each year.
PNP chief Gen. Oscar Albayalde revealed that 26,685 positions are still unfilled as of December 31, 2018.
“On the basis of these vacancies, ibig sabihin, we are 2 years and a half behind in our hiring program,” Drilon said.
“You are not hiring fast enough, notwithstanding the authority given to you to hire 10,000 (personnel) per year and yet with 26,685 vacancies, that means we’re two years in a half backlogged,” he added.
Albayalde pointed out that the PNP receives a large number of applications, but only a few make it through the stringent hiring process.
5,000? 10,000?
In addition, Albayalde said that the PNP is only allocated a budget that would accommodate 5,000 new recruits a year.
“The actual budget released to PNP is only good for 5,000 new recruits, instead of budget for 10,000 recruits. That does not include training expenses,” Albayalde said.
“For the recruitment expenses, we are only given a budget for 5,000 recruits,” he added.
Police visibility
Drilon also questioned the police officer to population ratio in certain areas, noting that police visibility is a deterrent to crime.
Drilon said the ideal ratio is one policeman for every 500 residents (1:500)
Interior Secretary Eduardo Año said that the current authorized strength of police personnel is one police officer for every 504 residents (1:504) but on the ground, it is only one police officer for every 575 residents (1:575).
Albayalde explained that the PNP follows an 85%-15% police personnel deployment, where 85% of the police force is deployed in the field while 15% remain in the offices for administrative work.
‘Civilians for admin work’
Drilon also questioned the practice of assigning administrative work to police officers who are trained for peacekeeping.
“Why do we have policemen doing administrative work? Why don’t we hire personnel just for administrative work?,” the Senate Minority leader asked.
“The police officers are trained for peacekeeping, they are not trained to do office work. As a matter of policy, shouldn’t we have police officers do actual police work?,” he added.
Albayalde replied that the PNP is in the process of hiring 15,000 non-uniformed personnel and latest data showed that 11,768 non-uniformed personnel have so far been hired.
“This is to replace PNP personnel doing administrative work,” the PNP chief said.
“I would encourage you to pursue this kind of policy of having policemen visible in densely populated areas, including the shopping malls because that is a way of preventing crimes from being committed,” Drilon said. /gsg