BAGUIO CITY—President Rodrigo R. Duterte has formally appointed Mayor Mauricio G. Domogan as the new chairperson of the Regional Peace and Order Council in the Cordillera for a fixed term of three years.
Per Executive Order No. 775, series of 2009, the RPOC serves as the region’s policy-making on peace and order, among other related issues. Domogan’s appointment was personally delivered to him last Monday by engineer Marlo Iringan, regional director of the Department of the Interior and Local Government Cordillera office.
“We express our gratitude to the President and Interior and Local Government Secretary Ismael Sueno for their trust and confidence to our ability to lead the RPOC-CAR,” Domogan stressed. “We look forward to a harmonious working relationship with the different officials of the member agencies for us to be able to craft up-to-date policies suitable in sustaining the peace and order in the region.”
There will be no significant policy changes for the RPOC, the mayor said, while he is reviewing the policies that need to be updated, improved or overhauled to conform with the prevailing situation in the Cordillera.
Domogan said the continued existence of marijuana plantations in different parts of the region, despite numerous eradication operations but no cultivators being apprehended and jailed, is one of his priorities as RPOC chair.
Closer to home, the mayor will bring to the council’s attention the Philippine National Police’s alleged circumvention of the law related to assigning police chiefs to local government units “without consulting with the concerned local chief executives, who are empowered to choose the chiefs of police in their respective areas of jurisdiction.”
Domogan said the PNP Law, or Republic Act 6975, “is clear that an assigned officer-in-charge of a police station is only allowed to stay in his post for a maximum period of 30 days. The PNP is then mandated to submit a shortlist of qualified police officers to the local chief executive, from which the permanent chief of police will be chosen, he added.
He expressed disappointment over the sudden relief of several senior police officers who were selected by Baguio’s screening committee as the chief of the City Police Office without properly consulting with the mayor, “which is not in accordance with sound governance,” he said.
Ifugao will host the first RPOC-CAR meeting for this term within the first quarter of 2017, Domogan said.