MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine National Police-Internal Affairs Service (PNP-IAS) is eyeing to resolve all administrative cases pending before it by the end of this year.
IAS director Atty. Alfegar Triambulo said Friday they also intend to speed up the processing of cases through a digitization program.
“Meron din tayong tinatawag na project, ‘yung (We also have a project called) zero backlog,” he said in an interview with reporters after the groundbreaking ceremony for the new four-story IAS building worth P120 million inside Camp Crame in Quezon City.
According to Alfegar, IAS – considered the “police of the police” – has yet to resolve 500 cases that were filed since July this year.
However, he noted, the number of pending cases is still “manageable,” adding IAS already resolved less than 5,000 recent cases.
As IAS aims for zero backlog this year, Alfegar also revealed they lack personnel to allow IAS to dispense its function fully and more effectively especially that the PNP leadership intensified its internal cleansing program to rid the organization of scalawags.
He said that currently, IAS only has 800 personnel nationwide. Twenty-three of these are lawyers, while the rest are police officers.
This number of personnel, he said, is “not ideal” for a strong internal affairs unit.
In the past, Triambulo expressed intention for IAS to break away from PNP, citing that in other countries, counterparts of the unit are feared by policemen since it is independent of the police organization.
Triambulo said he will now leave to Congress on whether or not the unit should be separated from PNP.
“We will rely on their sound discretion and judgment on pagtayo ng isang opisina sa gobyerno (on establishing a new office in government),” he said.
Triambulo, meanwhile, said the new IAS building will serve as a motivation for personnel to perform their duties.
“Isang motivation kasi nakakataas ng prestige (It serves as a motivation as it increases our prestige), from a napabayaan (neglected) to a recognized unit na meron palang malaking tulong (that has a really big contribution),” he said.
He added that Lt. Gen. Archie Gamboa, PNP officer-in-charge, has also been “very supportive” to IAS since he assumed his post.
Edited by KGA