PDEA-BARMM seizes shabu, firearms and explosives in 2 operations

COTABATO CITY — Anti-narcotics agents arrested in separate entrapment operations on Saturday, November 14, four shabu peddlers, with three of them jointly operating a drug den all linked to remnants of a now defunct regional terror group.

Besides shabu, agents of the PDEA-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao had also confiscated an M16 rifle rigged with a scope, an M14 rifle, a shotgun, five rifle-propelled grenades and components for improvised explosive devices, from three suspects, owners of drug dens in Libungan, Cotabato and one town in the Bangsamoro Special Geographic Area in the province,

Agents of the PDEA-BARMM first arrested on Saturday a male narcotics trafficker in Purok 5, Barangay Marawi Poblacion in Marawi City. Lanao del Sur, an operation aided by the Lanao del Sur Provincial Police Office and local executives supporting the government’s anti-narcotics campaign in the province.

George Paul Alcovindas, regional director of PDEA-BARMM, told reporters on Sunday. November 15, that the suspect was immediately arrested by their agents and policemen after selling to them shabu during a tradeoff in Purok 5 in Barangay Marawi Poblacion.

PDEA-BARMM agents and police operatives confiscated P6.8 million worth of shabu from the suspect, reportedly linked to remaining members of the now non-functional Dawlah Islamiya.

In a separate operation on Saturday, PDEA-BARMM agents and personnel of different units under the Police Regional Office 12 also arrested three drug den operators after procuring from them shabu in their hideout in Purok 11, Sitio Matibong, Barangay Gumaga in Libungan, one of the 17 towns in Cotabato, a component-province of Administrative Region 12.

Alcovindas said on Sunday that their agents and policemen had seized P156,604 worth of shabu, which would be used as evidence in prosecuting them for violation of the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002.

Under state law, drug den operation is a non-bailable offense.

Local executives who supported the entrapment operation that resulted in the arrest of the three drug den operators n Purok 11, Sitio Matibong, Barangay Gumaga, confirmed to reporters that PDEA-BARMM agents and policemen had also confiscated from them an M16 rifle, an M14 rifle, a shotgun, five rifle-propelled grenades and materials needed in assembling home-made bombs that can be detonated from a distance using mobile phones.

The four illegal drug dealers arrested in separate operations by PDEA-BARMM agents and policemen on Saturday shared fractions of their earnings to remaining members of the now inactive Dawlah Islamiya terror group providing them sanctuary in hinterlands, according to local executives in Marawi City, the capital of Lanao del Sur and the municipal officials in Cotabato’s adjoining Libungan, Midsayap and Pigcawayan towns.