ANGELES CITY- Armed Forces Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Jessie Dellosa vowed yesterday to “show no mercy to erring personnel” to “prevent the relentless and exaggerated focus on corruption and human rights violations” within the Philippine armed forces.

This, even as Dellosa also reiterated “the need to upgrade equipment” for “territorial defense” as he noted “particular concern on matters of the West Philippine Sea.”

Dellosa cited these as among his priorities in his speech turning over his concurrent command of the unified Northern Luzon Command (Nolcom) to Lt. Gen. Anthony Alcantara in ceremonies held yesterday at the Nolcom headquarters at Camp Aquino in Tarlac City.

He also assured his audience that “your AFP is serious in continuing our organizational reforms.”

Dellosa has been Nolcom commander for a year before he was appointed AFP chief of staff. On the other hand, Alcantara, who belongs to the 1979 batch of the Philippine Military Academy, used to be Armed Forces deputy chief of staff and, before this, the commander of the 6th Infantry Division of the Army in Central Mindanao.

He stressed that “aside from being true to respecting human rights and international humanitarian law, we have also commendably executed justice by showing no mercy to erring personnel.”

“This is to stop some few rotten personnel from spoiling and degrading the majority or most men in uniform who are doing their job right. This is also to prevent the relentless and exaggerated focus on corruption and human rights violation in the AFP,” he said.

Dellosa lamented that “this constant heckling and scoffing at the AFP is undermining the esprit de corps, morale, corporate credibility, and effectiveness of this institution.”

“It ignores and mocks the fruitful efforts at reform that the AFP has been carrying out for many years now.

It further ignores the efforts and successes of the AFP in reform toward combating corruption and inculcating respect for human rights/ that have been undertaken or achieved already,” he added.

But Dellosa said that “threat groups will always do something to prove us wrong.”

He said, however, that “guided by the Internal Peace and Security Plan (IPSP) Bayanihan, this means it is requiring us to exercise our maximum tolerance.”

Dellosa also cited concerns over “territorial defense”, noting Nolcom’s “particular concern on matters of West Philippine Sea and the need to upgrade equipment of the Navy and the Air Force.”