By AARON B. RECUENCO
The reign of Batch ’86 of the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) is about to end.
From “Bato” to “Pikoy”, it was PMA Class 1986 who lorded it over the Philippine National Police (PNP), but that is about to change on Tuesday with the retirement of the last of the Sinagtala Class member.
Unless his tour of duty as PNP Chief is extended, General Camilo Pancratius “Pikoy” Cascolan is the last to retire from the PMA Class 1986 as he reaches the mandatory retirement age of 56 on November 10.
Asked if he would be extended, Cascolan said he would leave it to President Duterte.
Cascolan also said that he has no idea on rumors that he would be appointed as the head of the Bureau of Customs.
The supposed last man standing for PMA Class 1986, Maj. Gen. Jose Maria Victor Ramos died last month due to health complications brought by the injuries he suffered from the helicopter crash in Laguna.
“I am happy because I was given the chance and never expected it because it was just two months away from my retirement,” said Cascolan.
Cascolan is the fourth member of PMA Class 1986 to be appointed as Chief PNP since the now Senator Ronaldo ‘Bato’ dela Rosa took over since the start of the Duterte administration.
Dela Rosa was followed by Oscar Albayalde and then Archie Gamboa.
The PMA Class 1986 was instrumental in Duterte’s bloody drug war campaign, with Dela Rosa initiating it and Cascolan refining it by crafting the OPLAN Double – which targets both street-level drug pushing and big-time drug traffickers – when he was still the head of the Directorate for Operations.
But the drug war has its challenges for the PMA Class 1986 since the PNP was kicked out twice from the campaign against illegal drugs after the death of 17-year old Kian delos Santos who was executed but was made to appear that he traded shots with Caloocan City cops and later the death of South Korean Jee Ick Joo who was arrested under the guise of anti-drugs operations but was later killed right inside Camp Crame. Both occurred under Dela Rosa’s time.
Albayalde, on the other hand, was forced to quit early after he was implicated in a drug recycling allegation when he was still the director of the Pampanga Police Provincial Office.
Cascolan said that he got used to having short stints in important posts, citing his five-week tour of duty as NCRPO director.
But he said he had done a lot in his two months as Chief PNP, including the localization of assignments program. (Aaron Recuenco)
