CAGAYAN DE ORO, Philippines – Nearly 400 armed government personnel, mostly from the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), continue to provide security for Vice President Sara Duterte, Philippine National Police (PNP) chief General Rommel Francisco Marbil told a Senate panel on Monday, August 5.
Marbil said this after Senators Ronald dela Rosa, Robinhood Padilla, and Christopher Lawrence Go, allies of the Dutertes, inquired about the PNP’s move to reassign 75 police officers from Duterte’s security detail to other posts. The relieved police personnel accounted for only about 19% of her security aides.
Duterte, in a Facebook post on July 29, called the removal of 75 police officers from her security detail “political harassment.” She noted that it happened after she resigned as education secretary, and criticized President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s recent State of the Nation Address (SONA), and after a fake video of a man resembling the President sniffing cocaine went viral on social media.
Duterte also questioned Marbil’s claims that her security was reduced due to a lack of threat and PNP personnel shortages.
Marbil denied during the live-streamed Senate committee hearing that the PNP’s move had anything to do with politics or that he was pressured, saying they were merely rationalizing police deployments.
He told the Senate committee on public order and dangerous drugs that Duterte’s security detail still consists of 358 soldiers and 31 police officers or 389 security aides.
“I don’t even know the policemen,” he told senators.
He explained that the reassignments were part of the PNP’s broader strategy to optimize the deployment of its personnel assigned to safeguard officials and those under threat.
Marbil said the PNP also pulled out police officers assigned to secure other officials, including generals.
“We need more people on the ground,” Marbil told the committee, which convened to investigate the alleged excessive force used in the June 10 raids aimed at capturing fugitive preacher Apollo Quiboloy and five others in Davao, Samal, and Sarangani.
Asked by Dela Rosa whether the PNP had evaluated a potential threat against Duterte from the New People’s Army (NPA), Marbil said the assessment found no actual threat to the Vice President.
He added that the Presidential Security Command is responsible for such assessments, while the PNP merely provides augmentation.
“She doesn’t know the remaining officers assigned to her. Please permit her to choose those from Davao,” Dela Rosa pleaded with Marbil.
In response to Dela Rosa’s appeal, Marbil agreed to allow Duterte to select police officers for her security detail. – Rappler.com