THE PHILIPPINE Senate on Monday ratified the bicameral conference committee report on a Philippine National Police (PNP) reform bill, that would give the national police chief the authority to designate chiefs of police nationwide and immediately detain erring cops.
At Monday’s plenary session, Senator and former national police chief Ronald “Bato” M. dela Rosa who sponsored the bill, said the reconciled version of Senate Bill No. 2249 and House Bill No. 8837 includes a provision requiring the Philippine National Police Academy to recruit cadets from all regions in the country, “as far as practicable.”
The PNP will also be tasked to allow technical police officers to be assigned to units within their expertise even these are outside of units they were accepted in.
The refined police reform bill will also require The National Administrative Support Unit and Women and Children Protection Group to be headed by a female police director with the rank of police brigadier general. — John Victor D. Ordoñez
