The passage and enforcement of local ordinances for the mandatory observance of minimum health safety protocols are good measures to decongest police detention facilities amid the order of President Duterte to arrest those who would not wear face masks and violate the rule on physical distancing.
Police Gen. Archie Francisco Gamboa, chief of the Philippine National Police (PNP), said that once policemen arrest the violators, those collared will surely be brought to the police station and would be detained since what would be used to file charges are national laws.
But if local ordinances would be used against the violators, those who would be arrested may just be fined or be meted with community service, depending on the penalties set by the local government unit (LGUs).
“The use of local ordinances will not only declog our jails but also of the BJMP (Bureau of Jail Management and Penology) because if national laws were used against the violators, those charged will be turned over to the BJMP for detention,” said Gamboa.
“But if it is the local ordinances, then violators may just be fined with P1,000 or P2,000 or even community service,” he added.
Interior and Local Government Secretary Eduardo Año has been urging LGUs to approve an ordinance that sets uniform guidelines and penalties across the country for those who would violate the minimum health safety protocols, such as violation of curfew, not wearing face masks and violation of physical distancing.
Año explained that having a uniform ordinance for all LGUs would synchronize all the efforts of the national government to defeat the COVID-19.
Police Lt. Gen. Guillermo Eleazar, commander of the Joint Task Force COVID Shield, has been urging LGUs to pass local ordinances on minimum health safety protocol in order to tap barangay tanods (watchmen) and the city and town public order and safety personnel to assist in the implementation on the community level.
Gamboa said that the effort to defeat the COVID-19 is not only a national government effort but a responsibility of everybody.
“Let us work together and part of this is for the LGUs to enact ordinances. On the part of the public, please follow the rules so that you will not be in trouble because COVID is really a serious matter,” said Gamboa.
Critics have been calling out the government for its policy of arresting violators, saying those arrested would only be more exposed to infection if they would put together with other violators in a small and cramped detention facility.