The Department of the Interior and Local Government 6 (DILG) has been recognizing the major role of force multipliers in helping the Philippine National Police (PNP) in keeping the country peaceful.

DILG Sec. Jesse Robredo said force multipliers such as Barangay Peacekeeping and Action Team (BPAT), traffic aides, and volunteer groups substitute the inadequate number of policemen in the country.

Robredo was in Iloilo yesterday to attend the DILG-6's First Summit on Disaster Preparedness.

He added that even the 140,000-strong PNP personnel could not cope with the country's population of more or less 95 million.

Ideally, police to population ratio should be 1:500 (one police officer per 500 persons), but given the country's current population, the ratio stands at 1:700.

Robredo said the country needs 50,000 more policemen to meet the standard ratio. Every year, he said, the number of new recruits reaches 3,000 to 5,000.

The secretary, however, said it's hard to meet the standard for now because of the fast growing population.

WANTED

Meanwhile, Robredo ordered the PNP to arrest the most wanted persons under their area of responsibility.

He said he already coordinated with PNP Chief Director General Nicanor Bartolome PNP to lower the crime rate percentage in the country.

In Region 6, Chief Superintendent Cipriano Querol, regional director of Police Regional Office 6 (PRO-6), said that apart from the DILG order, PNP Chief Bartolome told them to arrest high-profile persons under their most wanted list in order to prevent people being harmed.

Querol said, so far, the PRO-6 has met the required number of wanted persons arrested based on their crime rate percentage.*