By AARON RECUENCO ***
A graduating Philippine National Police Academy cadet faces summary dismissal proceedings for allegedly beating his classmate he caught drinking on New Year’s Eve.
Cadet 1st Class Joab Mar Nacnas warned his three classmates about using liquor inside the PNPA premises in Silang, Cavite after he caught them engaging in a drinking session at the roof deck of one of the buildings.
The confrontation led to a heated argument which ended with Nacnas being beaten up by Cadet 1st Class Denvert Dulansi.
Police Gen. Debold Sinas, chief of the Philippine National Police (PNP), said that he has already ordered the start of the dismissal proceedings against Dulansi and, at the same time, ordered the Directorate for Human Resource and Doctrine Development (DHRDD) to place him and the two other cadets engaged in the drinking session under restriction.
“The PNP has no tolerance for wrongdoings of erring personnel, and will never tolerate any misconduct, abuse, or breach of discipline,” said Sinas.
Nacnas was taken to the Qualimed Hospital in Sta. Rosa City, Laguna for treatment and is now on stable condition. Dulansi, meanwhile, was turned over to the Silang Municipal Police Station for investigation.
The PNPA is one of the major sources of PNP officers and cadets are full government scholars and already receiving salary. After graduation, they would be commissioned as PNP officers with a rank of police lieutenant.
The PNP has taken over the supervision of the PNPA to strengthen discipline-based training programs amid the controversies that hounded the academy in the past that include hazing and allegations that its academic, leadership, and disciplinary methods and policies are not at par with its counterparts in the Philippine Military Academy (PMA).
During the time of then PNP chief Police Gen. Alan Purisima, a standoff occurred between the PNP and the Philippine Public Safety College (PPSC) which then supervises the PNPA after a newly-installed PNPA superintendent, a PMA graduate, initiated drastic reform programs for the PNPA.
The move was allegedly opposed by the PPSC which prompted an irate Purisima to pull out 49 police instructors in 2013. Alleged anomalies that expose cadets to wrongdoings were unmasked and cited as the reason why drastic reform program was needed at the PNPA.
In 2019, the PNP took over PNPA and the National Police Training Institute (NPTI) which handles the training programs for new police recruits due to the enactment of Republic Act 11279.
