PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte on Monday said the death of alleged drug lord Melvin Odicta and his wife solves his drug problem in Iloilo and the neighboring Negros provinces.
“[Odicta’s] the top drug lord. He’s dead? That solves my problem,” Duterte told reporters in a press briefing with reporters in Catbalogan, Samar.
“He’s the number 1 drug lord. I was informed that the Odicta couple were shot dead. I cannot say anything good or bad, but that’s the path that they chose,” he said, noting that Odicta “was corrupting everybody including governors.”
Alleged Iloilo drug lord Melvin Odicta Sr. and his wife Meriam were shot dead at around 1:30 a.m. Monday at the Caticlan Jetty Port in Aklan.
Aklan police provincial director Senior Supt. John Jamili said the Odictas were onboard a 2go Ro-Ro from Batangas to Caticlan Port, when two unidentified assailants shot the couple dead upon arriving.
“This Odicta is really being hunted in Iloilo, in Negros. He was really unlucky,” Duterte said.
“Who wants to take Odicta’s place? It’s already vacant,” he added.
Western Visayas regional police director Chief Supt. Jose Gentilles, said they are looking into the possibility that the couple’s big-time drug associates were behind the ambush-slaying, fearing what the couple disclosed when they reported to Interior Secretary Ismael Mike Sueno on Thursday.
PNP Public Information Office (PIO) spokesman Sr. Supt. Dionardo Carlos meanwhile said they will verify a report that the Odicta couple were caught carrying firearms illegally while they were at the Batangas port Sunday evening before boarding a Ro-Ro (roll-on roll-off) vessel bound for Caticlan.
Carlos said they will check whether the assailants were on the same Ro-Ro, which would raise questions on why their firearms were not seized while those of the Odicta couple were confiscated.
Meanwhile, PNP chief Dir. Gen. Ronald dela Rosa said it was “public knowledge” that Odicta was a drug financier in Western Visayas. Odicta was reportedly on the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency’s drug watch list as the “topmost drug financier” in the region.
“Who are the Odicta couple trying to fool when it is public knowledge that they are drug lords,” dela Rosa said.
The Odicta couple went to Camp Crame, Quezon City on Thursday to surrender themselves to Sueno and to deny their involvement in the illegal drug trade.
Meanwhile, three companions of the Odicta couple were arrested on Monday.
Now detained at the Batangas City Police detention center were Maria Victoria Laygon, Marlon Susano and Manolito Susano for illegal possession of firearms, after they were found with three handguns. The suspects failed to present necessary documents for the firearms.
On Monday, Duterte announced a P2 million bounty on policemen and their cohorts who were involved in the drug trade.
Referring to rogue cops as “ninjas,” Duterte said he will reward those who can link the policemen caught in the drug trade.
“I want the police and the armed forces to destroy the drug apparatus in this country. We all know that the Philippines is being used as a transhipment point. This must not continue,” Duterte said.
Asked to clarify about the President’s statements, Dela Rosa said Duterte is referring to every policeman who will be implicated in the earlier list he revealed and the upcoming one, which is still undergoing further verification.
Communications Secretary Martin Andanar over the weekend said that the government’s unrelenting antidrug campaign, which has claimed almost 2,000 lives barely 60 days after President Duterte was sworn into office, would be entering its “second phase,” which includes the rehabilitation of some 600,000 drug users who turned to the police.
“The President wants to (end the drug problem) as soon as possible. The President promised that within three to six months, the problem will solved by 70 to 80 percent,” Duterte said over state-owned dzRB radio.
When told the President had consistently said that drug users could not be rehabilitated, Andanar said Duterte was only referring to individuals who sniff “shabu” (methamphetamine hydrochloride) on a daily basis.
Andanar said that those using nonsynthetic substances and others regarded as occasional users may still undergo rehabilitation in government-funded institutions.
The President said that he doesn’t want for the country to end up as a “narco-state.”
“I consider the fight against drugs as a war. There’s a crisis in this country. We might still end up like the South American countries and their fractured government,” Duterte said.
“If the military will not do its part and will leave it to the police alone, we cannot ever, ever suppress the drug problem. It has infected every nook and corner of this country, involving generals, mayors, governors, barangay captain, and so many of the ninjas we call them. These are the police who are into it,” he added. – With Joel E. Zurbano, PNA
