Rogue cops, lack of discipline and ‘volunteer’ work

In the first week this May, around a thousand police auxiliary personnel, reportedly, were recruited by the city government of Davao to augment its police force in the fight against criminality, more particularly, drug trafficking and abuse. These recruits will undergo training and, like regular police recruits in training, are supposed to be purged of their “hidden hunger”—for a lot of money, for luxuries, for women, etc.—and of any abusive tendencies. Both kinds of training are supposed to hone the recruits for sane, dedicated public service.

In my own observation, something is lacking in such trainings. Why is it so commonplace to see or hear of policemen themselves openly flouting the law, or extorting money, or protecting drug lords even, to cite a few instances of police malfeasance? The answer is: lack of discipline.

In past years, on the eve of Christmas and New Year’s Day, the nozzles of guns issued to cops are taped so that these would not be unnecessarily fired during the festivities to prevent untoward incidents. But why must this be done? The leadership itself has little trust in policemen, believing they lack discipline?

The Department of Health, also shortly before Christmas through New Year’s Day and several days thereafter, would place government hospitals on “red alert” for firecracker victims (most of whom ignored the law and refused to exercise some self-discipline, which is the reason they end up in hospitals for treatment). Time we banned the manufacture of firecrackers.

Smoking has been banned in public places, primarily for health reasons. Why not ban the planting of tobacco altogether, like the planting of marijuana is? Why not replace tobacco with potatoes or some root crops? Or convert tobacco farms into dairy farms like what has been done in the southern states of the United States, a move that made the farmers more progressive?

And why, as the opening of classes nears, must the Department of Education mobilize the so-called “Brigada Eskwela,” where parents and guardians have to render voluntary labor to clean the school grounds, repair the broken parts of schoolbuildings and then repaint them. I feel so sad watching the “volunteers” on TV, as they go about their work. After all, these volunteers mostly come from poor families.

Is this to show the bayanihan spirit Filipinos are known for all over the world? Except that everybody knows the Department of Education gets one of the biggest, if not the biggest, allocations in the annual national budget. The allocation includes funds not only for the teachers’ salaries but also for the improvement and repair of school facilities.

I had a long stay in America, but I cannot remember a time I had to render such “voluntary” labor; the children just went to school (free elementary and high school education) where they were given free meals and free pencils and writing paper pads, and other materials needed for their schooling.

RICARTE C. RAMIRO, Wellspring, Phase 2, Catalunan Pequeño, Davao City