THE DEPARTMENT of National Defense on Wednesday said that about 10,000 personnel would have to be deployed to help implement the mandatory ROTC program.

During the Senate hearing on the ROTC revival, Defense Undersecretary Franco Nemesio Gacal said that it would take “enormous“ requirements to enforce ROTC.

“Ang DND pabor kami sa mandatory basic ROTC program but certain requirements must be addressed to run this program, the requirement is enormous,” Gacal said.

He explained that there are 2,400 Higher Education Institutions and if the DND assigned four personnel to each institution to run the program, they would need at least 9,000 to 10,000 military personnel.

Gacal made the statement in answer to Senator Robinhood Padilla’s question.

“Gusto ko magtanong. Noong unang lumabas ang patungkol sa mandatory military training at sinuportahan natin ‘yan, ang gusto natin talaga lahat. Pero noong nakaraang admin po, sinabi ni Sec. Delfin Lorenzana na hindi kaya ng budget na magkaroon ng mandatory training ang lahat. Puwede linawin, kasi nabasa ko news article, puwede po linawin, magkano ang gagastusin sa training ng ating kabataan kung lahat, ang sinasabi ni Brig Gen Garcia na lahat, OSYs, nag-aaral. Kaya ba ng AFP bigyan ng training ang lahat?” Padilla said.

“We asked AFP kaya ba natin, aside from financial requirements. That is why we have this consensus bill. We have to have the same objective by sharing these burdens. Dapat magkaroon ng citizenry ready to be utilized,” Gacal said.