THE Philippine National Police is bent on accomplishing goals under Oplan Double Barrel Alpha.
Deputy Chief for Operations Police Director Benjamin Magalong said while the PNP is hoping for a drug free Philippines, police are hopeful to contain the drug problem in the country with the expanded anit illegal drugs campaign.
“Ang sa amin lang is ma accomplish ang ibinigay sa amin na mandates,” the high ranking official in an interview on Friday at Camp Dangwa in the Cordilleras said.
“That’s the reason why we are very aggressive to perform our duties guided by the concepts and the different platforms of the Double Barrel Alpha. In fact, recently, we have introduced Double Barrel Alpha emphasizing on arrests rather than neutralization, just to address on the issue on extra judicial killings,” Magalong pointed out.
Magalong admitted that sweeping drugs in the country is a difficult task but they have been emphasizing on continuous drug clearing operations in spite of the many challenges.
Aside from that, the PNP has conducted continuous field offices evaluation throughout the country so there will be no let ups in the campaign on fighting illegal drugs.
“In Police Regional Office-Cordillera, you have a high performance on high valued targets, sustained ang operations against marijuana. It is very challenging because it entails a lot of effort, logistics, movement of troop on target areas. The campaign against meth, the operations are non-stop. So the regional director here was never considered as one of those units for observation. Unlike other regional offices, some of them have to be relieved from ranks or some had to go for observation,” he said.
With the shift of administration, the PNP began “Oplan Tokhang” in a bid to persuade drug users and pushers to surrender to the authorities and undergo rehabilitation but the campaign has become an issue after thousands of individuals have been killed.
The retiring Magalong will leave his post with a legacy to PNP on the reforms through the introduction of technology and systems they have established which were institutionalized, the principle of transparency especially on managing financial resources and logistics, and showing the public the PNP is very objective when it comes to investigating sensitive issues to avoid compromising their credibility and sworn duty.