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Saturday, November 22, 2003
Fama: Cops not betting on jueteng
MANGALDAN chief of police Chief Insp. Harris Fama denied the report that a jueteng collector regularly goes to the police station to get the policemen's bets.
"The report is baseless and meant to destroy us," he said.
Reportedly, the jueteng collector is a slim individual, about 5'2" in height, dark in complexion and rides a bike when he goes to collect the bets at the station.
Fama said if the man goes to the station and the crime is ongoing, the bet collector could be arrested, even by the civilians.
"Nevertheless, I will personally look into this because I know the description," he said.
The police chief cited an instance when a media practitioner came to his office and pointed to a woman collecting jueteng bets in an area between the police station and the office of the Mangaldan Water District.
"We saw that the woman was holding a paper and a ballpen, so I pulled the mediaman and told him that I would apprehend her personally," he said.
They purportedly approached the woman and asked her to present the paper and they found out that she was only listing passenger jeeps passing the area, going to Manaoag.
"What I am driving at is that if a policeman, or even a civilian, sees a person collecting bets, he could immediately arrest that person, and that is a citizen's arrest," Fama said.
But he lamented that never in the history of the town has there been a citizen's arrest on a bet collector.
As to the anti-illegal drug campaign in the town, he said based on the police intelligence information, the drug personalities in the town are now scared. They had already apprehended about 30 persons and the drive is still continuing.
Fama said they have just started the campaign and the drive is just heating up.
He said what is good in this campaign is that Mayor Tito Sarzaba and the rest of the municipal officials are helping the police, not just in the apprehension of drug pushers and users, but also in the information dissemination on the ill effects of prohibited drugs.
The police chief said they, along with the Municipal Anti-Drug Abuse Council (Madac), have a program involving the officials and residents in the fight against prohibited drugs.
"We are also conducting information-education in various secondary schools, both private and public," he said.
Fama said the police in this town do not have a problem on the funds to finance their operation because they have a Madac fund and that the incentive being given by the provincial police office is also helping.
"If there is a fund from the provincial office, it is good, and if there is none, it is still alright because there is the Madac fund that could be used in the anti-drug operations," he said.
He issued the statement in response to the reported complaint of some policemen on the financial incentive for every arrested drug personality, which they do not receive in full.
(November 22, 2003 issue)
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