Albayalde: ‘I did everything, I gave my best’

https://www.facebook.com/pnp.pio/videos/3024653410940785/

FORT DEL PILAR, Baguio City, Philippines – The road was unclear when an engineering hopeful ended up entering the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) in 1982.

The young lad, fondly called Odie, was on a forked road. He chose to enter the military school, initially due to “financial constraints” and at the urging of his father, an officer of the Philippine Air Force.

Thirty-seven years later, the lad returned, now a man bearing four stars on his shoulders, to witness a testimonial parade and review participated in by cadets in his honor at his alma mater – a ceremony accorded to retiring officials who have secured ranking posts in the military and police service.

“When I was a cadet, I knew it would be hard. Although I have no idea [how hard it will be],” said Odie — that is, Philippine National Police chief Gen. Oscar Albayalde, who will reach the mandatory retirement age of 56 on Nov. 8.

He recalled how his mistahs (classmates) used to call him by that nickname, a shortcut for Oscar David, since they could hardly pronounce his surname.

Facing reporters on Saturday, Albayalde narrated how “rigorous” his first day at the academy was. But he said his determination and desire to serve the country kept him in the state’s premier military school.

“It was nerve-wracking, but then again you have to be determined,” Albayalde said, speaking partly in Filipino. “If you really want it, you can endure whatever they do to you. One thing that I said before: I will only leave PMA when I am dead.”

The parade was intentionally set on the same day that Albayalde’s class, the Sinagtala Class of 1986, whose members were then in their second year, walked out of their classrooms to protest the dragging of two of their classmates in a hazing case in the 1980s.

He said his classmates were not held liable for the case and are now three-star generals.

“But then we were punished. We marched around that oval every day under the heat of the sun,” he recalled.

After the parade, Albayalde expressed his gratitude to the academy, where he said he was first molded as a leader, and where he first chose to commit more than half of his life both as a cadet and a police officer.

But even as he plans to take a vacation with his family after his retirement, the road for the nation’s top cop seems to be playful as he faces another controversy before he finally hangs his police uniform – the issue on alleged “ninja cops” or police officers reselling seized drugs.

He dismissed accusations that come at such a time as this as “part of life” and of the challenges in leading the 190,000-strong police force.

He also stressed that the government has been “really, really serious” in its campaign against the drug trade – which has been hounded with alleged human rights violations – with the PNP as the “face of the war on drugs of this administration.”

“No ifs and buts. There are no ifs and buts here,” he said.

Asked of what legacy he would want to leave the PNP, Albayalde said: “I really do not know. Let the people judge me. I don’t know what people will say. Whatever they will say I will accept.”

“For myself, I did everything. I gave my best,” he went on, before taking a short pause. “I gave my best.”

/atm