Protecting forest rangers
IT is heartening to know that the 210,000-member Philippine National Police (PNP) is committed to continue protecting the country’s “vast and diversified environment.”
The PNP chief issued the statement after it was reported that the Philippines was listed as one of the world’s deadliest countries for land and environmental defenders.
In its latest. report, Global Witness, a non-governmental organization, ranked the Philippines as the third nation with the highest number of deaths, with 29, in 2020.
Colombia and Mexico came in first and second with 65 and 30 killings, respectively.
Global Witness is an NGO that focuses on holding firms and governments accountable for the destruction of the environment, which is also being threatened by climate change.
The remaining forests across the globe, including the Philippines, continue to disappear because of illegal loggers, land developers and “kaingeros” or “slash-and-burn” cultivators.
As the government’s top law enforcement agency, the PNP, which is civilian in nature but national in scope, is mandated to protect our dwindling natural resources and forest rangers.
PNP chief Gen. Guillermo Lorenzo “Guilor” T. Eleazar said the national police agency would continue to strictly enforce the nation’s environmental laws, rules and regulations.
“The PNP stands with our ‘kababayan’ in pushing for the protection of our environment through the enforcement of related laws as part of our eco-friendly commitment,” said Eleazar.
He cited an instance two months ago wherein the PNP’s Special Action Force (SAF) immediately acted on the attack against two forest rangers in the province of Rizal.
Hopefully, the PNP, Department of Environment and Natural Resources and other concerned government agencies work in unison to protect the country’s “environmental defenders.”
