PNP has to man up

I WAS watching local news on TV and for the whole hour, reports were all about the series of crimes from the different parts of the country. Even this circulation printed quite a lot of heinous crimes happening in the city. In fact, the city has been ranked No. 1 in robbery cases in Northern Mindanao.

Crimes are indicators of a lot of things, one of which is the desperate living conditions of some of our citizens. Still others are the lack of employment opportunities that pushes people to resort to breaking the law to survive. Still another would be the prevalence of illegal drugs.

One thing is for sure––the situation is alarming. The spite of criminality calls for more drastic measures. Though most crimes are petty, they don’t make us feel secure in walking the streets of our city.

And since law inforcement lies mainly in the hands of the Philippine National Police, then it would be right to insist that the PNP should man up.

Obviously, their programs of crime prevention is found wanting. Otherwise these crimes would not have happened. They have to feel a sense of urgency in coming up with drastic measures. I am sure some inconveniences are very much welcomed if the public is assured of safety and security.

If police visibility was greatly felt during the fiesta celebration, why can’t it be done on a daily basis? I always get to wonder why there are more than enough PNP personnel during special events. Where do they go on regular days? They are obviously paid regularly, we might as well utilize them.

I have high respects for our PNP but their strategies are simply not working in crime prevention and crime solution. The alarming security situation calls for business not to be as usual. If they will only do what they always did, then we will only get what we always got––the rising criminality. It simply can’t be business as usual.

The new trend now is to make the private sector and the other agencies get involved because crime prevention is not the sole responsibility of the PNP. So get them involved if we must but the initiative again should fall under the hands of the PNP.

Every crime committed should be a slap on the PNP, its programs, and its leadership. Because if there are places that have very low crimes, then it can therefore be done.

The national government has allocated more than enough budget for our Philippine National Police. All our local governments also have been very generous with our Municipal Police Stations by providing them fuel and logistical support. There is simply no excuse for the laxity and failure of the PNP to establish an effective peace and order program. They just have to man up for crying out loud.