Speaker to ‘Bato’: Quit, you’ve lost police’s respect

PNP chief Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa.
INQUIRER FILE PHOTO / GRIG C. MONTEGRANDE

Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez on Friday asked Director General Ronald “Bato” Dela Rosa to quit his post as chief of the Philippine National Police (PNP) to save President Rodrigo Duterte from further embarrassment following the murder of a South Korean businessman at Camp Crame.

In a blistering statement, the House leader spared no words in chastising the PNP chief for the killing of businessman Jee Ick-joo allegedly by rogue police officers after he was kidnapped in October in the guise of an anti-drug “Tokhang” operation.

Alvarez said Dela Rosa should immediately resign to restore respect to the office of the PNP chief amid a swirling controversy over the “meltdown of PNP discipline” that had led to such “Tokhang-for-ransom” cases.

READ: ‘Bato’ not to blame for murder of Korean, PNP tells critics

“The commission of a heinous crime right [under his] nose is not only an insult but a clear indication that he has lost the respect of his people,” he said of the beleaguered Dela Rosa, who admitted feeling extreme embarrassment over the incident.

READ: I want to melt in shame—Bato

Alvarez also skewered Dela Rosa for what he described as the latter’s propensity to seek the limelight.

“General Dela Rosa seems more interested in having a showbiz career and in landing on society pages of newspapers with his being everywhere doing mundane things like singing videoke and watching concerts,” the Davao del Norte congressman said.

He added that social media such as YouTube were now replete with the “booboos of General Dela Rosa,” including his stunt during a recent press conference when he ran away “like a headless chicken after the pyrotechnic device he was holding started to smoke.”

“How can we believe the stern statements Dela Rosa had been making against criminals like in the aftermath of the Davao City bombing when he was the first to run in the slightest possibility of danger?” Alvarez said.

He said Dela Rosa should buckle down to work “or better yet give the job to someone else who is dead serious in leading the PNP in its multi-pronged war against drugs, criminals and the scalawags within its ranks.”