Marcos vetoes PNP reform bill

MANILA, Philippines — President Marcos has vetoed a bill seeking to reform the Philippine National Police (PNP), saying it runs counter to his administration’s rightsizing policy.

In his veto message to the Senate on July 5, Marcos said that while he lauded the intention to modernize the PNP, “I cannot approve it because the provisions run counter to administrative policy and efficiency.”

Marcos said he could not approve Senate Bill No. 2449 / House Bill No. 8327 or An Act Providing For Organizational Reforms in the Philippine National Police, as “the rightsizing policy of the government must be given significant importance. As much as possible, we need to prevent overlapping functions and redundancies, and must adhere to the basic rightsizing principles.”

He cited the provision which institutionalized the directorial staffs, area police commands (APC), special offices and support units, and yet it “does not consider the functional relationships of the different offices and fails to clarify reporting lines.”

Marcos also found the activated APCs redundant because its mandate to supervise “inter-regional and trans-regional police and disaster response operations” is already being done by other police offices.

“With the adoption of the Directorate System, the APCs may be superfluous. Besides, let us not wait for the time when there will be misencounters among our police forces due to their overlapping functions,” Marcos said.

The Chief Executive also said that the reorganization “without coordinated working relationships” might result in “bureaucratic inefficiencies.”

Another provision that violates the rightsizing program is the creation of a liaison office for the Office of the President (OP) and for the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG).

Marcos said a liaison office to the OP “may pose security and confidentiality risks,” while the DILG liaison office “may insulate the PNP Chief from the DILG Secretary.”

He also finds the liaison office to be headed by a brigadier general as “plainly unwarranted,” with the PNP being a civilian agency already under the DILG secretary, who is also the alter-ego of the President.

Marcos also took issue with the