No tolerance for rights abuses: NCRPO chief

National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) Acting Regional Director Chief Supt. Guillermo Eleazar. (PNA photo)

MANILA — National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) Acting Regional Director Chief Supt. Guillermo Eleazar has assured that authorities will not tolerate human rights abuses, and has vowed to investigate reports of policemen allegedly abusing the rights of criminals.

“If they (policemen) violate them (guidelines and protocols on handling criminals), we will not tolerate them. We will investigate,” he said in the Philippine News Agency (PNA) show, “Pros and Cons”, aired every Friday.

Human rights abuse covers violations done by the state and all its agents.

Eleazar further said the times are changing as citizens are becoming more vigilant, very transparent, and open to investigation.

“We need community participation. We are open to that (internal cleansing),” the former Quezon City Police District chief said.

He clarified that parading a criminal on the streets is illegal, unless a case has already been filed against him.

Eleazar, however, pointed out that they are balancing the rights of criminals with the rights of citizens, who also have the right to know who these criminals are so they could file a case them.

He gave a rating of eight out of 10 for the country’s respect for human rights.

Philippine Alliance of Human Rights Advocates secretary general Rose Trajano, however, disagreed with Eleazar’s rating.

“The level of impunity in our country is very high and we should question the government why the impunity is high,” Trajano said, defining impunity as the lack of punishment and justice.

She said her group is “saddened and alarmed” because 4,000 out of the estimated 20,000 drug-related deaths were from major police operations.

Based on data from the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA), the current administration has conducted 102,630 anti-drug operations, with 147,802 drug personalities arrested and 4,354 drug personalities killed in anti-drug operations as of June 30, 2018.

Eleazar, meanwhile, urged the public to give them the presumption of regularity that they are performing their job.

He emphasized that the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) functions as a credible third-party investigator in these cases of human rights abuse.

As of July 6, a total of 4,671 messages had been sent to the NCRPO hotline, with about 2,300 spam messages or advertisements, 1,492 messages of thanks, 475 actionable complaints, and 38 complaints that were resolved quickly.