NCotabato police rated region's best

KIDAPAWAN CITY, Philippines - The North Cotabato provincial police office was rated as this year’s best in law enforcement and crime prevention activities from among all units of the Region 12 police command.

Among the accomplishments for 2013 of the North Cotabato provincial police was the prompt prevention of an attempt by soldiers to sneak out a big volume of undocumented lumbers from Alamada town using trucks of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division.

Members of the Alamada municipal police had shot and wounded two combatants of the 6th ID escorting the lumbers for refusing to disarm.

The seized forest products have been turned over to the provincial office of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources.

Senior Supt. Danilo Peralta, North Cotabato’s provincial police director, said Chief Supt. Charles Calima, police director for Region 12, announced the feat during a command conference in Gen. Santos City over the weekend.

“We are grateful to God almighty, first and foremost, and to our provincial governor, Emmylou Talino-Mendoza, for helping us achieve our peace and security goals for 2013,” Peralta told reporters.

Calima was quoted in reports by different radio stations on Monday as saying that the North Cotabato provincial police had indeed been cited as top from among all police units in Central Mindanao, in terms of performance.

Peralta said it was for the support to their law enforcement and peace-keeping missions of the inter-agency North Cotabato provincial peace and order council, whose presiding chairperson is Mendoza, that they achieved their objectives for this year.

Peralta said the mayors in North Cotabato, through Mendoza’s initiative, have also been supporting the activities of the provincial police office.

Another major accomplishment of Peralta's office for 2013 was its assistance in convincing local members of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) not to join the followers of MNLF founder Nur Misuari who laid siege for three weeks on four barangays in Zamboanga City last September.