Barbers pushes death for drug lords

Sen. Robert Barbers asked President Arroyo yesterday to lift the moratorium on the death penalty against drug lords and pushers to save Filipinos from the "clear and present danger" they pose to society.

Barbers, a former Manila police colonel, said implementing capital punishment against drug lords and pushers who have been sentenced and are already on death row would be an effective deterrent, adding that this will reinforce the "intensified crackdown" on drug traffickers.

"President Arroyo must officially lift the moratorium on the death penalty and line the convicted drug lords to the gallows and send a strong signal to drug traffickers to desist from their nefarious criminal activities."

Barbers said the President should apply the strategy of Chinese leader Mao Ze Dong for quelling lawlessness and upholding discipline, which is to "kill the chicken to scare the money."

"The reason why illicit drug trafficking continues to proliferate and wreak havoc on our youth is because the prosecutorial arm of the law enforcement is weak," he said. This weakness sends "a wrong signal to narcocriminals that they can always get away from any criminal liabilities."

"Whatever happened to the case of Mayor Ronnie Mitra of Quezon, who was caught transporting 503 kilos of shabu in October 2001? That happened two years ago but, until now, the case is still gathering dust in the courts," he said.

He said the President’s declaration of an all-out war against drugs is a concrete step in the right direction and that it shows how intelligence-gathering at the barangay level can help law enforcers curb the drug menace.

However, Barbers believes that "collared drug pushers must be meted the commensurate penalties."

"The government should not hesitate to impose the maximum penalty of death to convicted heinous drug offenders," he said. "It has been a long time ago that a Chinese national, Lim Seng, was put (before) a firing squad in the early days of martial law."

Barbers concluded that if just one convicted and sentenced big-time drug lord is meted the lethal injection as mandated under the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002, "the public would be made more aware of the government’s serious effort" to end the scourge wrought by illicit drugs "and send a dire warning to drug peddlers that their criminal acts do not pay."

The Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002 authored by Barbers amended the Dangerous Drugs Act to impose harsher penalties on drug trafficking, manufacturing, possession and use.

While the penalties are harsher — including meting the life imprisonment or death penalty for possession of over 10 grams — the President has declared a moratorium on executions.