Take on drug lords, Lim, Lacson dared

Opposition to a "selective scarlet letter" campaign of Interior Secretary Alfredo Lim and Philippine National Police chief Deputy Director General Panfilo Lacson mounted yesterday as 13 lawmakers strongly criticized the anti-drug crusade.

The lawmakers were one in saying that Lim and Lacson should spray-paint the "huge mansions of big-time drug lords" instead of the apartments and shanties of small-time drug pushers.

And to see just how tough Lim and Lacson are, the National Democratic Front (NDF) said it would like to see the two officials daub with red paint the house of a certain presidential friend, whom the communist leadership hinted was a "jueteng lord doubling as a drug lord."

Sen. Rodolfo Biazon, chairman of the Senate committee on defense and national security, said Lim must paint the houses of big-time drug lords, adding that targeting only the small-time pushers is "anti-poor and contrary to the pro-poor stance of the Estrada administration."

For his part, Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile said that while Lim may have the best of intentions, the practice is unconstitutional and violates the basic principle of presumption of innocence.

"It also maligns and punishes even innocent people who live in the targeted houses," Enrile said.

Sen. Francisco Tatad said that if Mr. Estrada needed a painter for the Department of the Interior and Local Government, he should have appointed someone "with a better sense of color like Mauro Malang, Federico Alcuaz or even Florentino Dauz."

Tatad, a member of the administration party and of the Commission on Appointments, said Lim "must learn to act like a Cabinet secretary, not like a beat policeman who has not heard of the Bill of Rights or the Miranda doctrine."

"If he has a passion for painting, let him indulge that in his own time upon retirement from public but not for now," he said.

Tatad said that opposition to Lim's method should not be taken as favoring the proliferation of drugs, stressing that everyone wants to be on the side of the crimefighter.

"But there can be no license for any shortcut that offends the Constitution and the law and places in jeopardy the rights of the innocent," he said.

Sen. Raul Roco, another member of the appointments body, questioned why a Cabinet member like Lim should be implementing a city ordinance.

"Ordinances are implemented by the local executives. Unless Secretary Lim becomes mayor again, he cannot implement a city ordinance," Roco said, while expressing concern that one of these days, Lim might decide to implement an ordinance of Naga City, Roco's home town.

Roco and Tatad are two of the five CA members who have questioned Lim's "shame campaign."

The others are Senators Aquilino Pimentel Jr., Tessie Aquino Oreta, and Franklin Drilon.

Pimentel had said that Lim was "creating a problem for himself" in undertaking the spray painting.

At the House of Representatives, Rep. Ignacio Bunye (Lakas, Muntinlupa) said if the government is serious in its anti-drug campaign, it should spray-paint the houses of drug lords living in plush villages, not those living in barung-barongs (shanties).

"If they want to show their honest-to-goodness drive, they should ... not discriminate," he said.

Rep. Ernesto Herrera (LAMP, Bohol), the founding chairman of the Citizens' DrugWatch, seconded Bunye's observation, adding that the campaign should not be limited in Manila.

"Lim should enlist the entire police organization and local government units, over which he has supervision, in the campaign against illegal drugs," he said.

Herrera also urged Lim to work for the transfer to Camp Crame of the suspects in the smuggling of more than P1 billion worth of shabu seized by agents of the National Drug Enforcement Center recently in Pangasinan.

He said he fears that the suspects might disappear mysteriously one of these days.

For his part, Rep. Miguel Zubiri (Lakas, Bukidnon) said Lim should spray paint shabu factories and not mere "retail outlets."

"He must make a dent on the supply and this can only happen if nerve centers are paralyzed," he said. "The flow of drugs will not be stemmed if the sources, the financiers, the brains are not neutralized."

Zubiri said that by limiting the spray-painting campaign to slum areas, the impression Lim and Lacson give is that both drug peddling and consumption are a poor man's vice when the problem cuts across all economic classes.

Rep. Prospero Pichay (Lakas, Surigao del Sur) said Lim should go after the so-called "untouchables" in the illegal drug trade.

Rep. Nestor Ponce (LP, Manila) agreed with Pichay's statement, adding that only a handful of drug pushers have been arrested. Of these, fewer have been penalized.

Rep. Joker Arroyo (LAMP, Makati) observed that Lim and Lacson have been selective in their spray-painting activities.

He said the identities of the biggest drug lords in the country are already known to officials of Lim's agency and the PNP who have released these lists in various congressional hearings.

"So why is Secretary Lim and General Lacson hitting the small fries and sparing the big guys? Why the selectiveness?" he asked.

The Makati lawmaker said his question about selective spray-painting does not mean that he is condoning what the two officials have been doing.

"This is just to say that when this illegal practice is applied selectively, then the illegality is further compounded. Playing favorites in the application of an illegal ordinance," he said.

He said Lim and Lacson should go after the drug lords.

"Reams and reams of congressional testimony attest to the proposition that there should be no drug dealers or pushers if, to begin with, there are no drug lords. If drug lords are eliminated, drug trafficking will collapse," he said.

He added that drug lords have remained "sacred cows" despite Lim's and Lacson's spray-painting campaign.

While continuing to receive flak from lawmakers, the two officials have won the support of Manila Archbishop Jaime Cardinal Sin for their campaign.

Sin said the drug menace has reached alarming proportions that tough measures are needed.

But just like Arroyo, Sin said he would want to see the campaign done in plush villages where big-time drug dealers mostly reside.

According to Jose Ma. Sison, founder of the local communist movement and "chief political consultant" of the NDF, "the drug scourge has spread throughout the country and reached even the most remote barrios because the jueteng lords double as drug lords and use their network of jueteng collectors to distribute drugs."

"The biggest jueteng lords who double as drug lords are close to Mr. Estrada and Lacson. I challenge the government to paint the house of one of these lords with the words, `this is the house of a drug lord'," Sison said in a statement.

He said the President and Lacson are "phony anti-crime crusaders" who "coddle some crime lords and make news by gunning down other crime lords outside their network."

On Lim, Sison said the former Manila mayor made a publicity stint by "pretending to stamp out prostitution in Ermita, Manila, but was close to Chinese brothel owners doing brisk business in Chinatown."

"Lim should be ashamed of posturing against small fry. He should try one of President Estrada's friend for size," Sison said.

Meanwhile, President Estrada said the spray-paint campaign of Lim will soon be undertaken in plush villages.

But as of now, "we cannot do this" because of the lack of policemen, Mr. Estrada told a radio interview. --