PCO: Lower crime rate during Marcos term vs previous admin

MANILA, Philippines — The Palace on Friday said that President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s term has so far recorded a lower crime rate when compared to the same time frame of former President Rodrigo Duterte’s administration.

The Palace cited data from Department of Interior and Local Government Secretary Benjamin Abalos, who presented the information to the President during a meeting on Thursday.

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“He pointed out that the peace and order situation in the country has improved with a much lower index crime volume from 196,519 — from the pre-pandemic period of July 1, 2016, to April 21, 2018 — to 71,544 from July 1, 2022, to April 21, 2024,” said the Presidential Communications Office (PCO) in a statement.

Index crimes, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority, are crimes that the Philippine National Police (PNP) deemed “serious in nature” as they frequently occur to the extent of these being a tell-tale sign of how crime-ridden an area is.

According to the PCO, the average monthly crime rate also fell from 21.92 percent during Duterte’s time to 15.04 percent during Marcos’ time within the same period.

“Non-index crime volume also decreased from 345,398 from July 1, 2016, to April 21, 2018, to 300,257 from July 1, 2022, to April 21, 2024,” said the PCO.

The Philippine National Police (PNP) has also recorded a 98.88 percent total crime clearance efficiency from January 1, 2023, to March 31, 2024.

“The PNP also recorded 82.69 percent of total crime solution efficiency from January 1, 2023, to March 31, 2024, which is 0.62 percent higher than the figures reported from October 2021 to December 2022,” said the PCO.