“The war on drugs should be conducted within the limits imposed by law.”
Do you still remember what President Duterte said about the drug problem in the country early on in his term?
What he said early on was that there were no less than 3 million Filipinos hooked on illegal drugs, particularly methamphetamine hydrochloride or shabu—and selling them to boot out in the streets—and these people were mainly responsible for murder, rape, robbery, and other crimes punishable under our statutes.
The solution? “I would be happy to slaughter all of them,” he said on television.
Was this a hyperbole? Or perhaps a joke, as his mouthpiece often claimed when his boss was caught with one foot in his mouth?
Not by any means, it turns out.
During the 2016 election campaign, some 16 million Filipinos believed in Duterte’s promise to rid the country of illegal drugs in three to six months, and gave him the mandate to sit in Malacañang for six years until 2022.
In fact, the bloodbath started soon after election results showed Duterte winning by a comfortable margin over his nearest political rival, or even before he took his oath of office on June 30, 2016.
It now appears that early on, following Duterte’s orders, the police leadership imposed quotas on regional, provincial and city/municipal police offices to get rid of 30 drug suspects daily, with the province of Bulacan and several Metro Manila cities racking up the highest scores under Oplan Tokhang and Oplan Double Barrel.
In effect, Duterte transformed the entire country into a killing field reminiscent of the “howling wilderness” that a town in Samar island had become during the American occupation, when the American commanding general in the town ordered his men to kill every male over the age of ten after an attack by Filipino insurrectos on a garrison of American soldiers left no survivors.
The Duterte administration’s war on drugs has resulted in nearly 7,000 deaths of suspected drug users and traffickers, according to official police reports that said the victims purportedly fought back (“nanlaban”) when they accosted them. But this official narrative is contradicted by human rights groups here and abroad who claim that in fact between 20,000 to 30,000 have died in the hands of vigilante groups in what they say are summary executions or extra-judicial killings.
The Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) that is now on top of the war of drugs has reported that between July 1, 2016 and April 30, 2021, they conducted 200,632 anti-illegal drug operations that resulted in the arrest of 289, 622 persons and the death of 6,117 drug suspects; dismantled a total of 784 drug dens and clandestine laboratories; cleared 21,891 barangays out of the total 42,045 barangays; arrested a total of 12,069 high-value targets; arrested a total of 971 government workers in anti-drug operations (478 government employees, 381 elected officials, and 112 uniformed personnel); seized drugs and laboratory equipment worth a total of P59.14 billion, with shabu alone worth P48.70 billion and the rest consisting of cocaine, ecstasy and marijuana.
As 2022 unfolded, and with his term due to end on June 30 this year, Duterte said recently that he would never apologize for the killings in his bloody war on drugs.
The subtext of that intransigence or obstinate refusal to admit any wrongdoing in the conduct of his campaign promise to rid the country of the scourge of illegal drugs is that up until the last day of Duterte’s six-year term, law enforcers are likely to continue without let-up in running after small-time drug traffickers and users—leaving the big fish scot-free to continue with their merry ways and that the war on illegal drugs will not wind down until the middle of this year.
That likelihood is not going to be good news for the Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC) that has indicated in no uncertain terms that it is determined to conduct a full-blown probe of the Duterte administration’s violent anti-war crusade after he leaves office.
Duterte has chosen to ignore allegations of massive human rights violations in the conduct of his war on drugs from various quarters, including then US President Barack Obama, the US State Department, various UN Rapporteurs on Human Rights, and the European Community. He has likewise attacked our own Commission on Human Rights (CHR), local human rights groups as well as international human rights watchdogs such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch for raising a furor over the bloodbath.
At issue here is whether the end justifies the means.
If the goal is to wipe out the problem of illegal drugs, the state is justified in going hammer and tongs against big-time as well as street -level drug traffickers with all the resources at its command.
We believe, however, that the war on drugs should be conducted within the limits imposed by law. In other words, it should uphold due process and the rule of law at all times. This does not mean that law enforcers cannot use deadly force when circumstances warrant it. But if the nanlaban narrative is used to justify plain and simple murder most foul, then that is not something that can be blithely ignored, nor swept under the rug. The promised outcome—a country free from illegal drugs—does not excuse any wrong committed to attain it.
What is clear is that the Duterte administration’s war on illegal drugs and by extension, against political dissent and activism, has metamorphosed instead into a war on human rights, due process and the rule of law. This is what makes a full-dress investigation by the ICC of the excesses in the war on drugs not only a matter of justice, but more important, a moral imperative.
(Email: ernhil@yahoo.com)