65,000 Manila cops are squatters

That's 56% of the police force, reports The Manila Times. The newspaper reports that the cops will get a pay increase next year. But don't count on that to make them move. I knew cops in India, Brazil and Turkey who were squatters. It's a question of how much apartments in legal neighborhoods cost.

Can governments across the developing world please think: if cops are squatters, then squatting is not breaking the law. If public servants are squatters, then squatter communities are not blight, but are simply affordable neighborhoods. Sometimes they're the only affordable neighborhoods in cities that otherwise make no provision for the poor.