PNP budget exec axed over papal fund mess

MANILA, Philippines - A Philippine National Police (PNP) official who served as budget officer of the Police Security Protection Group (PSPG) was removed from her post after police officers complained that they did not receive their allowance for helping secure Pope Francis’ visit, an official said yesterday.

Superintendent Evangeline Martos has been placed under administrative relief while she is under investigation for discrepancies in the allowance given to members of the PSPG, a unit tasked to provide close-in security to dignitaries and members of the papal entourage.

She will be held at the Police Holding Administrative Unit (PHAU) of Headquarters Support Service (HSS) at Camp Crame.

PNP officer-in-charge Deputy Director General Leonardo Espina has approved Martos’ administrative relief, as recommended by the PNP Directorate for Comptrollership, the unit handling the police force’s financial accounts.

“Espina acted swiftly and decisively on the recommendation of the PNP Director for Comptrollership to relieve Martos,” PNP spokesman Chief Superintendent Wilben Mayor said in a briefing yesterday afternoon.

Police officers, particularly members of the PSPG, complained that they were given only P700 instead of the P2,400 allowance for the eight days they were deployed for the papal visit.

Their deployment started three days before the pope arrived in the country.

The PNP said 28,000 police officers were deployed to secure the areas in Pasay, Manila, and Tacloban and Palo in Leyte that Pope Francis visited.

Five days have passed after Pope Francis left the country, but the PNP has yet to release how much it spent for the papal visit. But with P2,400 allocated for each of the 28,000 police officers for eight days, the PNP spent P67.2 million for meals alone.

Mayor said the PNP footed the bill for three meals a day for each police officer, their accommodations, gasoline and other miscellaneous expenses during the papal visit.

Food, not cash

On Espina’s instructions, Martos will undergo a pre-charge evaluation by the Directorate for Investigation and Detective Management over reports that the disbursement of food provisions had been delayed, Mayor said.

He said yesterday that the allowance released by the PNP headquarters to units involved in the papal visit was “not supposed to be given out as cash to police personnel, but allotted as provisions for food for the troops.”

He said there were some last-minute adjustments, such as the deployment of an additional 3,000 police officers to secure the Quirino Grandstand as Pope Francis said mass last Jan. 18.

“Due to changes in the deployment plan and the exigency of the situation prompted by the sheer volume of police personnel deployed in the papal visit events, some unit commanders considering further the peculiarities and demands of each area decided to give cash instead,” Mayor said.

‘Standard messing’

Mayor said Espina has instructed the Directorates for Logistics and Comptrollership to come up with a plan to provide a “standard messing” to PNP units whose members will take part in securing such events, including the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Forum at the Clark Freeport.

The standard messing program is supposed to provide enough food for all police officers who are deployed for these events.

“We hope this plan will become part of logistics management doctrine in the PNP,” Mayor said.