“Lowering the number of generals and improved personnel management are doable, but organizational restructuring needs a new law and will take a little longer.”
Last week, the new Secretary of the Department of the Interior and Local Government announced a plan to reduce the number of police generals from the current 133 to 25. Although I wholeheartedly agree that the PNP has too many general officers, the number being proposed is unrealistic. This is because the number of generals and other officers depends on the strength of the organization that currently stands at about 240,000.
That the PNP is badly in need of reform is beyond doubt especially in view of what happened to the organization in the last several years. Reducing the number of police generals, however, is just one among the many that needs urgent reform. The organizational structure, personnel administration and changing the current police culture must also be included.
As for determining the appropriate numbers of general officers, there are many ways of doing this. First and foremost, the PNP must have a Table of Organization and Equipment or TO&E as it is known. With a TO&E, promotions to general and other ranks can only be done when vacancies exist. What is happening today is that there are no strict regulations being followed for promotion. This is why there are many senior officers on floating status assigned to the office of the Chief, PNP doing nothing yet continue to receive their salaries.
It also used to be that there were only three or four three-star Generals in the PNP — the two Deputies, the Chief of the Directorial Staff, and occasionally the NCR Commander. Today however, the PNP followed the AFP and started promoting officers to that rank without any warm bodies to command. These are called area commands composed of two or three regional offices under one three-star general officer. It is cheapening the rank but it is now standard practice that officers whom the powers that be want to get rid of are relieved and assigned to these units to await retirement.
But going back to an appropriate number of generals, just how many police generals should there be? There is no exact number because the strength of the PNP is not static. But a good way to start is to have one general officer for every 3,000 men which is roughly equivalent to a brigade in the army. That would peg the initial number of generals to about 80. Whoever will be assigned to work on the TO&E could then calculate how many colonels, lieutenant colonels, majors, and so forth down to the patrolman are needed. This way, promotions in the PNP will not depend on the whim of the top brass.
As to the issue is personnel management, recruitment policies and training have to be reviewed and modernized. In the old Constabulary, recruits sign up for a three-year tour after which they are allowed to reenlist after undergoing another evaluation process. Today, once a recruit takes the oath, it is good until retirement. With so many personnel getting involved in illegal activities, it would be better to go back to the old system so that there is a way to weed out undesirable elements in the organization.
The current PNP organizational structure is also too rigid making it difficult to meet the new challenges of crime fighting like transnational crimes and cybercrimes. The PNP cannot just dissolve, reorganize or create new units unless a law is passed authorizing them. As the Senate and House hearings on POGOs and the Alice Guo escape have shown, our police is badly in need of improving its capability to deal with transnational and cybercrimes effectively.
To be sure, the challenge that the SILG brought to himself is enormous and there is no assurance of success. As they say, the PNP is always in need of reform. But it is difficult to reform. At least, he is willing to try. Lowering the number of generals and improved personnel management are doable, but organizational restructuring needs a new law and will take a little longer. The hardest to accomplish is indoctrinating the PNP to change the culture of unbridled corruption and vigilante justice in order to regain the trust of the people that it is supposed to be serving and protecting.
