1 Strike policy vs. corrupt cops DUTERTE PROPOSES HIGHER PAY BUT TIGHTER REIN ON POLICEMEN

By Manny Pinol

Davao City Mayor Rody Duterte, confronted with a hypothetical question on what he would do to curb corruption in the country’s police force if he were President, said he would increase the policeman’s basic pay to at least P70,000 a month but hoist an iron fist to strike an erring cop on his first offense.

“Kung ako ang Presidente, I will give a police general a basic pay of P500,000 and the lowest ranked policeman at least P70,000 a month,” Duterte told RPN 9 and CNN Philippines Chairman Amb. Antonio Cabangon-Chua who called on him Wednesday night in Davao City.

“I will give them higher pay. I will provide them protection for actions done in line of duty. But I will hit them hard at the first instance they betray public trust,” he said.

Asked by Cabangon-Chua, who also owns Graphic Magazine and 27 radio stations all over the country including the powerful DWIZ based in Metro Manila, what he would do to policemen involved in drugs and criminal syndicates, Duterte curtly replied: “Patayin ko.” (I will kill them.)

Everybody in the table with Duterte and Cabangon-Chua laughed until they realized that the City Mayor was serious.

Cabangon-Chua, who visited Davao City along with his son, Edgar, to prepare their local TV station branch prior to the launching of CNN Philippines, asked Duterte how the colorful city mayor was able to maintain a well-disciplined police force in a city now known as the 4th Safest City of the world.

“You will really have to rein in the policemen because they are offered a lot of opportunities to make money because of their law enforcement powers,” Duterte told the former ambassador.

“You get loose with them and they could get involved with drugs or criminal syndicates because they could earn a lot of money,” Duterte said.

Duterte admitted to Cabangon-Chua that the City had its own share of rogue policemen but added that “I dealt with them.” He did not elaborate.

Duterte said there are fundamental reforms which must be done in the country’s police force starting from the recruitment process where police applicants are made to cough up huge amounts just to be included in the recruitment.

“A police applicant is made to cough up between P300,000 to P500,000. What do you think he will do when he becomes a policeman?” Duterte told Cabangon-Chua.

Duterte added that the involvement of higher officers of the PNP in corruption worsens the situation.

“When you have top officials of the PNP accused of corruption, how do you think that affects the lower ranked police officers?” he asked.

The country’s police force have been the subject of controversies lately because of charges of corruption and unexplained wealth leveled against some of its top officials, the involvement of policemen in extortion, drugs, rape and even robbery.

“Unlike the Army soldiers who could not freely leave their camps, policemen have the power of arrest and law enforcement and that gives them the opportunity to make money,” he said.

In Davao City, policemen and Army soldiers receive one sack of rice every two months and a share of Mayor Duterte’s intelligence fund which comes as incentives to performing Army soldiers and policemen.

Recently, traffic policemen who arrested former Davao City Mayor Atty. Sarah Duterte-Carpio, the City Mayor’s daughter, for violating the city’s 30-kph speed limit, were personally congratulated by the older Duterte and given cash incentives.

(Photos caption: Mayor Duterte with RPN 9/CNN Philippines Chairman Antonio Cabangon-Chua, his son, Edgar, Laguna businessman Rene Concordia and other broadcast officials; Mayor Duterte turns over incentives to policemen.)