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Local authorities are often criticized for mistakes in dealing with
crisis situations, while the successful handling of emergency
situations is hardly given media attention.
Yet graduates of a rigorous and sustained
multiagency training program, ongoing since 2004 and supported by
the British government, have already demonstrated their increased
effectiveness in responding to crises, like the 2004 floods in
Quezon, 2006 landslide in Southern Leyte, 2006 Ultra stampede and
the 2007 Glorietta 2 explosion are just a few examples.
These activities came to light during a recent
commanders course and simulation exercise for the National
Counter-Terrorism Action Group (Nactag) held in Camp Crame last
week. It was the last simulation exercise under the RP-UK Crisis
Management Assistance Program (CMAP), organized through a
partnership between the Philippine Center for Transnational Crime
and the British Embassy.
Executive Secretary and Anti-Terrorism Council
Chairman Eduardo Ermita complimented the team for the efforts they
exerted to address terrorist threats, and said CMAP has been “very
crucial and doubly significant to the Nactag’s work.”
In his opening remarks, the Philippine National
Police Chief, Director General Avelino Razon, shared his own
experience as a participant in previous trainings, praising his
British “mentors and tormentors” for imparting techniques for
the tough, disciplined, and firm handling of crisis situations.
“The scenarios they developed were deceptively
simple, and pushed everyone to ‘think out of the box’—to think
as terrorists would, with only the creativity of the human mind
setting the boundaries for what is possible”, Razon said.
The CMAP trainings mixed a set of seminar
sessions with exercise simulations of real-world crisis situations
in real-time, with participants having to anticipate realistic
contingency situations and to create an effective, multidisciplinary,
and multilevel response system to crisis arising from terrorism and
transnational organized crime.
Under the program, a series of effective crisis
management and counter-terrorism simulation exercises, with the
assistance of British security specialists, were undertaken in
preparation for recent critical events such as the 12th Asean
Summit, the Inter-Parliamentary Union Assembly, and the Southeast
Asian Games. In addition, the continued safety of Boracay, Baguio,
Cebu, and Davao, as well as the Metro Rail Transit in Metro Manila,
have been the subjects of a series of tabletop and live exercises,
which still continue.
The program already delivered a team of
highly-trained field commanders and honed the skills of a
disciplined core of trainers that can be mobilized to conduct
training throughout the Philippines.
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