The Philippine National Police (PNP) has started its security preparations for the first State of the Nation Address (SONA) of President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos, Jr. at the Batasang Pambansa in Quezon City this month.
PMGEN VALERIANO T. DE LEON. PNP Director for Operations, said they want to come up with the security plan as early as possible in order to cover every situation outside and inside the Batasan Pambansa, where President Marcos will deliver his speech to reveal his plan for the country.
Banking on the success of the security during the May 9, 2022 national and local elections, which were declared as the most peaceful and the fastest, as well as the inaugurations of Vice President Sara Duterte-Carpio and President Marcos, De Leon expressed confidence that it would be the same for the SONA.
“We want to prepare as early as possible so that we can have the best security measures for the SONA.” We want to come up with a good template, a good security plan that we will present to our PNP OIC PLTGEN VICENTE DANAO, JR. for review and approval, “said De Leon.
De Leon said that security preparations for SONA are a yearly activity for the PNP and he said they will be banking on the successful SONA’s in the past to ensure that there will be no security glitches.
“Year in, year out, we are preparing for SONA, so we are now reviewing all the security plans before, and we will adopt the best practices before and make the necessary adjustments based on the lessons we learned from the past,” said De Leon.
“For this year, I will personally supervise the preparations to come up with the best security plans that will be implemented for the first SONA of our President Bongbong Marcos,” he added.
Part of the planning, according to De Leon, is how the PNP would deal with the protesters, who, he said, are always present every year.
This early, De Leon said they are recommending the freedom parks for protesters where they could peacefully and orderly hold their programs.
This plan was found to be successful during the inauguration of President Marcos on June 30 at the National Museum.
“We respect the role of the protesters in what they would do, but your PNP will not allow them to disrupt any activities that include causing trouble and creating traffic on any busy roads in Metro Manila,” said De Leon.
“We will have freedom parks for them and just like what happened during the inauguration, we will not disturb their program and we will not even ask for any permit for their activity provided that they do not go out of the designated freedom parks,” he added.
De Leon also appealed to the militant groups and individuals to always ensure that unnecessary conformation with the police and disruption of regular activities would be avoided in all their protest actions.
“Let us show to the world the kind of political maturity that we have and that we are all looking forward to a better country,” said De Leon. —story by Raoul C Esperas (Patrol 45)
