More ‘hot meat’ seized in Caloocan

Vigilance on the part of cooperative community residents led to the seizure of more hot meat being peddled by unscrupulous traders to unsuspecting buyers in Caloocan City.

Caloocan City Mayor Enrico Echiverri yesterday commended the City Veterinary Office (CVO) for the seizure of some 35 kilos of already decomposing pigs’s liver and ready-to-cook shanghai rolls made likely from the same unsanitary and contaminated meat sources.

CVO chief Dr. Teodoro Rosales said his men confiscated some 15 kilos of the newly delivered hot meat from vendors along the Powerline Market in Bagong Silang, Caloocan City (North). In another operation the following day, the CVO raiders seized some 18 kilos of newly delivered uncooked shanghai rolls near the same market.

The seized meats were immediately buried in an open lot beside the City Hall quadrangle parking lot, Rosales said.

Echiverri said that based on information furnished by concerned residents to the CVO, a closed van was seen delivering the decaying meats and distributing it to vendors out for a quick buck at very cheap prices. He said the vendors allegedly pay to the distributions only for those they were able to sell to unwary customers.

The mayor advised the public to be extra careful with the apparent return of the illegal operations likewise urging them to patronize only meat and meat products that passed the inspection of the CVO.

Last month, the CVO seized some 700 kilos of "double dead meat" and other meat products abandoned in an L-300 van in a street near city hall and some 10 kilos of frozen imported leg quarters being sold in a market, also in Bagong Silang.

The seized meat reportedly came from farms in Bulacan and neighboring areas and sold at dirt cheap prices usually in sidewalk stalls or ambulant vendors in Metro Manila. No suspects have yet been arrested. — Jerry Botial, Pete Laude