Philippine National Police (PNP) officer-in-charge Lt. Gen. Archie Gamboa today offered the nation’s corpulent cops a hard-nosed ultimatum: either watch your weight, or watch your career suffer.
Gamboa made the announcement in a press conference where he disclosed that he will be signing a directive denying access to training courses — often necessary for advancement — to policemen of all ranks who fail to meet certain standards for body mass index, or BMI, an indicator that calculates a person’s weight against their height to determine whether it falls within a healthy range.
“If you’re not compliant with the BMI, you will be denied schooling,” Gamboa said. “Once you have complied with your BMI requirements that’s the only time you can go schooling. This is gonna be painful, because there is some schooling that is required for certain positions, and there is schooling that is required for certain promotions. If you are deprived that, if you can’t comply for one year, it will greatly affect your career.”
Gamboa’s directive will purportedly cover all policemen, from generals to patrolmen, and is aimed more at making cops more health-conscious, he maintained.
“This is not all about the image of the PNP… but this is more on individual responsibility. What we want to focus on is your health, for you to live long,” Gamboa said.
Filipino cops are notorious for being overweight, prompting Interior Secretary Eduardo Año yesterday to also chime in on the matter, encouraging officers to get physically fit to command “respect” from the public.
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