NARCO-POLITICIANS should be kept out of local politics, Malacañang insisted Tuesday following President Rodrigo Duterte’s plan to end the terms of all barangay officials and replace them with his appointees.
“I suppose the President’s intention is to keep them [barangay officials] out of active politics,” Presidential Spokesman Ernesto Abella said when asked about the status of the President’s crackdown on the politicians in his drug list.
He said the postponement of the barangay elections was a Palace priority.
Duterte had reiterated a claim he made last year that 40 percent of all the barangay captains in the country were involved in drugs based on police intelligence.
He postponed the barangay elections scheduled in October last year, saying many barangay officials were included in his list of personalities involved in the illegal drug trade and that it had only been five months since the last general elections in May 2015.
The regional police directors last received the copies of Duterte’s “narco-list” in January, with the police getting the go-signal for their distribution.
But none had been heard from the authorities on the government’s crackdown against the barangay officials identified in the drug list.
The US State Department had earlier questioned the “accuracy” and “legitimacy” of Duterte’s “narco-lists,” saying the government had not revealed the source of this information.
Asked what the Palace had done to pin down the barangay officials in the narco-list, Abella said the Justice Department had yet to initiate prosecution against those officials.
“I’m sure they can take the initiative,” Abella said.
“This particular move to postpone the barangay elections is what the President has said again and again to make sure they won’t enter active politics.”