POLICEMEN in the Cordillera Administrative Region are set to start a tokhang-type of strategy to address communist insurgency in the area, Regional Police chief Brig. Gen. RWin Pagkalinawan said yesterday.
Tokhang is a PNP operational plan in the campaign against illegal drugs, where policemen knock on the residence of suspected drug users, convince them to surrender, and go through rehabilitation process.
“(It’s a) simplified approach for counter-insurgency. Same as how we approached illegal drug personalities,” Pagkalinawan said of the tokhang-type effort to rid the region of the insurgency problem.
Pagkalinawan said he does not expect the strategy to be bloody. He said the strategy will be implemented based on the resolution recently passed by the Regional Law Enforcement Coordinating Committee that he co-chairs with NBI-Cordillera regional director Hector Geologo.
Pagkalinawan said policemen have finished training on how to implement the strategy, which he said may start next month.
