President Marcos has ordered the Philippine National Police (PNP) to further reduce the crime rate in the country.

Marcos made the directive despite the decrease in the number of index crimes in the country. He issued the order during the command conference in Camp Crame on Tuesday, June 4.

"Well, first of all, very encouraging itong index crimes natin. Perhaps we can work a little bit on all the figures for those crimes. Well, most of them are going down. We just need to see what are the underlying reasons why it hasn't totally gone down,” Marcos said in a mix of Filipino and English.
 
“But everything has gone down. Theft has gone down, rape has gone down but rape is still high. Other index crimes and all of them are more or less --- at least we can say that we are doing better than we were before,” he added.

The President also instructed the police force and the government to improve its capabilities in fighting cybercrime, citing the weak cyber security within the government.

“We will improve our capability. Nagulat nga ako (I was surprised) they don’t have a server. Kaya’t mahirapan talagang proteksyonan kung hiwa-hiwalay (It would really be hard to protect it if the servers are separates). Although there’s also an element of security ‘yung (on the) standalone,” Marcos said.

“Because that would require so much for effort and the technology that will be there, pati hardware diyan magiging tama ‘yan, ‘yung sa cybercrimes.  We’re improving the rate at which we are able to take the crime, and we are able to prosecute those who are implicated in those crimes," Marcos added.

He further said that consolidating PNP data through the use of a central database is needed to enhance security.

The Chief Executive also cited that the  government is doing better in the fight against illegal drugs, noting the confiscation of 321 tons of illegal narcotics in the first five months of 2024.

He told the police force to keep on conducting raids to lessen the supply of drugs in the country.

Crimes decreased

In its report to Marcos during the command conference, the PNP said the number of crimes decreased by 8.264 percent, from 204,557 from July 2022 to May 2023 to 187,652 from July 2023 to May 31, 2024.

Crime solution efficiency also remained relatively stable at the 60 percent mark throughout the nearly two-year period.

In the campaign against illegal drugs, the PNP reported the conduct of 92,904 operations, which led to the arrest of 116,740 individuals and seizure of PhP11.89 billion worth of illegal drugs.

These include 1,213,689.66 grams of shabu; 9,673,808.00 grams of dried marijuana leaves; and 7,818.323 grams of marijuana plants.

In cybercrime,  PNP said 421 entrapment operations were conducted; and 13 search warrants were served.

According to the PNP, the operations led to the arrest of 1,370 individuals; rescue of 4,157 victims; and filing of 1,975 cases in court.