THE war against drugs will soon enter its third phase— that of rehabilitating arrested drug users – and only China has offered to help the government which on Saturday announced the allocation of more than P1.45 billion for its National Drug Rehabilitation Program.
Speaking before a conference of banana exporters in Davao City, Duterte lauded China for quietly helping the country without fanfare for itself nor loud criticism before the international community.
He said China is already about to complete a drug rehabilitation facility inside the military’s Fort Magsaysay in Nueva Ecija that can house 1,400 drug addicts from the different parts of the country.
“China is about to complete it. No boasting, no news, no publicity. It’s about to be completed,” he said. “”Four million drug addicts are no joke. We are not a rich country. It is only China who has helped us.”
A Chinese philanthropist who has been donating funds for school buildings in the Philippines, particularly in Mindanao, donated the funds for the construction of the Nueva Ecija facility.
Experts have been concerned at what the government will do with arrested drug addicts and the police has encouraged local government units to invest in their own rehabilitation facilities.
Chief Superintendent Camilo Pancratius Cascolan, chief of the PNP’s directorate for operations, has encouraged local government units to build their own rehabilitation centers.
Cascolan said the number of addict surrenderers have decreased due to the lack of rehabilitation centers in the country.
“They [drug surrenderers] are confused on surrendering because we do not have enough rehab centers,” he said.
But the government has allotted more than P1.45 billion to assist in the implementation of the National Drug Rehabilitation Program, to support the war on drugs, the Social Welfare Department said Saturday.
The proposed fund allocation, a total of P1,452,982,078.34 will be used in the creation of staff requirements of the DSWD Central Office, 18 Field Offices and 81 Social Welfare and Development Teams Offices, beginning October to December 2016 and January to December 2017.
Also included in the budget are fund for a Cash for Work (CFW) and the Sustainable Livelihood Program (SLP) to provide assistance to the recovering drug dependents along with other psychosocial programs of DSWD.
The program targets 376,916 estimated drug surrenderers for the months of October to December 2016 and another 41,708 estimated surrenderers from January to December next year.
Under the Phase III of the ‘war’ on drugs, the Health Department, along with the PDEA, PNP, BJMP, DILG and DDB will conduct screenings and referrals for appropriate services and provide needed support for those who will surrender and willing to rehabilitate.
The next stage of the drug rehab program will focus on a community-based and holistic recovery and rehabilitation program to make the community itself a “rehabilitation center” for the drug pusher, with the PNP, DSWD, Tesda, DILG and the DoH taking lead.
The last stage provides a wide array of after-care services to strengthen their rehabilitation and reintegration to the society.
