EDITORIAL - Poor performance

Should things go from bad to worse, a revamp is expected at the Cebu City Police Office. Director Noli Romana has reportedly been disappointed by the poor performance of the police force.

A month into his new assignment as the city's top cop, Romana said he was not satisfied with the performance of some of his station chiefs in terms of visibility and curbing the drug problem.

At least four police station chief are up for transfer as they "generally failed in their performance," Romana said. This week's reshuffling will be done when the city police director receives a recommendation from his staff.

Aside from the rampant proliferation of illegal drugs, the lack of police visibility that Romana had claimed could be the reason behind the rising crimes in the city. As exclusively reported by this paper last Friday, the CCPO booked a 37 percent increase in the crime rate from January to August this year.

This development could only mean that lawless elements have gained the upper hand. The police force seems to have been losing the battle. And now that we are entering the "ber" months, the public can only expect the crime rate to further shoot up as the people spend more to prepare for the holiday season. 

Let us be clear. It's really unfair to blame the city's new police director in this time when he is still warming his seat. But if the trend will continue, there must be something wrong with how the city police leadership handles the wand.

The reason why Romana had been transferred from Negros Oriental by the former regional police director was his reported failure to curb the illegal gambling there. But Cebu City is a different environment, where he has high chances to score some success considering he has the full support of the city mayor.

The only way to solve the city's peace and order problem is to act tough against those criminals. Romana knows that. So it's time for him to confront the problem more aggressively to show that he is on top of the situation.