Panel on PNP purge set to meet Monday

THE five-man team tasked to go over the profile of high ranking police officials who have submitted their courtesy resignations will convene on Monday to start their inquiry, Interior and Local Government Secretary Benjamin Abalos Jr. announced.

Abalos also disclosed that former Court of Appeals Justice Melchor Quirino Sadang is the fifth member of the panel. He said the probe was meant to identify who among the ranking police officials were involved in the drug trade.

“The investigation will be underway.

The important thing is to remove those who should be removed from the service and the innocent to be protected,” Abalos stressed. Sadang served as a panel member representing the Department of Justice in the Revolutionary Alliance Makabayan negotiating panel. He also b came vice executive judge and presiding judge of the Regional Trial Court, as well as a law professor of the University of the East.

The other members of the committee are Baguio City Mayor Benjamin Magalong, Philippine National Police chief Gen. Rodolfo Azurin Jr., former National Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro, Jr., and retired Maj. Gen. Isagani Nerez

The DILG chief made the appeal for the full colonels and generals to voluntarily resign in line with the government’s effort to cleanse the ranks and get rid of “bad eggs” in the PNP. The projected purge stems from the scandal on the so-called “ninja cops” or policemen involved in a money-making scheme through the resale of confiscated drugs. Joel E. Zurbano

SENATOR Nancy Binay on Thurs- day said the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (RCEP) will remove the barriers and restrictions on at least 90 percent of imported or exported products. From an economic point of view, the Philippines will get substantial market opportunities and benefits from the RCEP, which intends to harmonize the trade agreements of the ASEAN members with big trading partners like China, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand.

Binay said it would have huge negative impact on the country’s trade once lost.

“But we don’t want to rush things just yet,” she said. “Let us first wait and hear the contentious issues on some essential sectors, and when it will be brought to the plenary to inquire if there are still questions.”

All concerned agencies and sectors, she said, should also be prepared for a transition.

“Whether it will be passed or not, RCEP will continue, with or without the Philippines,” she stressed.

“However, the most important and what we need to know is our readiness for RCEP, and if we have already prepared parallel programs for the labor sector, and subsidies in the agricultural and production sectors,” the senator added.

Meanwhile, Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri and Senate President Pro Tempore Loren Legarda are expected to lead the RCEP ratification.

Abandoned car yields P183.6m shabu in P’que

POLICE retrieved 27 kilos of suspected shabu valued at P183.6 million found in an abandoned car in Parañaque City.

The Southern Police District (SPD), citing a report from the Paranaque police, said the discovery of the suspected illegal substance was made following a search of the abandoned vehicle. Thursday.

SPD director Brig. Gen. Kirby John Kraft said Mark Joseph Espinosa, a community watchman of Barangay Tambo, reported to the police about the abandoned vehicle, a red Toyota Innova with license plant CDI 9724 on Quirino Ave. corner M. Delos Santos Street shortly before nightfall on Wednesday.

The responding policemen noted that the vehicle appeared to be intact, with all doors closed but not locked, and that there was no sign that something was wrong about it.

However, the police found 27 vacuumsealed tea bags containing white crystalline substance suspected to be shabu, a white sack, a white plastic, one Lazada box and some car registration documents inside the vehicle.

Also retrieved from the van were a photocopy of a birth certificate, two photocopies of a driver’s license belonging to a certain Ma. Teresa Fernandez, a vaccination card belonging to a certain Patani Barauntong, and 37 P50-bills.

Kraft said the contraband was turned over to the SPD Forensic Unit.