COTABATO CITY, Philippines — Combined agents of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency and police personnel seized P20.4 million worth of shabu in an operation on Monday, September 28, in Barangay Pababag in the island Bongao town in Tawi-Tawi.
Local executives and members of the multi-sector Tawi-Tawi Provincial Peace and Order Council, whose chairperson is Gov. Ysmael Sali, separately told reporters on Tuesday, September 29, that the shabu trafficker Sheid Akmad Abdullah, who first tried to escape using a small speedboat when he sensed he had sold shabu to agents of the PDEA-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, was eventually arrested by pursuing policemen.
Local executives said the entrapment operation that led to the confiscation from Abdullah of no less than three kilos of shabu, costing P20.4 million, was together supervised by two operatives from the PDEA-BARMM, Kenneth Verador and their Tawi-Tawi team leader, Abraham Kalim, and supported by different units of the Tawi-Tawi Provincial Police Office.
George Paul Alcovindas, director of PDEA-BARMM, said the entrapment operation was premised on reports by local executives and Muslim religious leaders about the large-scale shabu trafficking activities in their province of the now-detained suspect, to be prosecuted for violation of the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002.
Alcovindas and senior officials of the Police Regional Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region had separately told reporters that Abdullah, also known as “Bradel,” and his accomplices first pulled out guns and opened fire at the PDEA-BARMM agents and policemen while about to arrest them, after a tradeoff in Barangay Pababag, and fled using their small but high-speed watercraft.
Abdullah was eventually cornered and clamped down by policemen after a brief chase in a pursuit operation aided by municipal and barangay officials in Bongao. He is now locked in a detention facility, awaiting prosecution in court.