MANILA – Police Lieutenant General Camilo Pancratius Cascolan has been appointed the new Philippine National Police (PNP) chief.
President Rodrigo Duterte signed the appointment papers of Cascolan, according to Secretary Eduardo Año of the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) last night.
Cascolan, deputy chief for administration, replaces Police General Archie Francisco Gamboa who is retiring today.
The Baguio City-native Cascolan, the next in line as PNP chief based on the rule of succession, previously served as chief of police of Balasan, Iloilo in 1998.
He also spent most of his junior and middle rank years in Western Visayas where he occupied various posts, starting as member of the now defunct Philippine Constabulary in Iloilo in 1988.
Cascolan was a member of the Philippine Military Academy Sinagtala Class of 1986. He had his elementary education at Maryknoll Convent School and later at the University of the Philippines Baguio High School.
Following his Region 6 stint, Cascolan was assigned to the PNP headquarters in Camp Crame, Quezon City in 1999 as head of the Special Research Division of the Philippine Center on Transnational Crimes, a position he held until January 2001.
He held various assignments that included as chief of police of Taguig City, provincial director of the then Compostela Valley province, and as No. 2 man of the Western Visayas police office where he earned his first star.
He was named PNP Director for Operations and later held the position of Regional Director of the National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) starting in April, 2018, where he conceptualized assigning policemen near their residences to make them more effective.
Gamboa, the Philippines’ 21st PNP Chief who served for less than a year, will step down on his 56th birthday today, the compulsory retirement age for uniformed personnel.
Like Cascolan, he was also a member of the Philippine Military Academy Class of 1986.
Past PNP chiefs who also belonged to the Sinagtala Class were now Sen. Ronald “Bato” Dela Rosa who retired from the police service in April 2018. He was replaced by Police General Oscar Albayalde who retired last Nov. 8, 2019./PN
