Duterte and the drug menace

The historic pre-trial of Rody Duterte at the International Criminal Court provides lessons that this and succeeding administrations must heed.

The biggest lesson – though secondary only to the fact that we shouldn’t be killing people – is that the drug menace in the Philippines remains unresolved. It must be addressed because it continues to destroy lives.

Dismantling the head of the snake

Duterte was right in saying that drugs were corroding the country. But the problem was never just the street peddler or the user in urban slums.

The problem lies in the supply chain and the ease that illegal drugs get into the country. The problems are the syndicates behind it, the men and women in power who allow these substances to get smuggled into the country or be manufactured locally.

It is appalling that drugs continue to destroy our people – rich and poor alike. And everyone who allows these poisonous goods to enter the country is responsible.

Obviously, Duterte failed to confront the problem at its source. Instead of dismantling the head of the snake, the campaign largely targeted those at the bottom of the chain.

What he succeeded in doing though was to sow fear among the users.

Those who live in druggie hotbeds claimed that the peddlers and users “behaved” during the time of Duterte. The streets felt safer, they said.

For instance, a source said, the construction workers of a listed company have stopped taking drugs – which they use to work long hours – during the Duterte administration.

In Pasig, in one notorious drug district, the druggies laid low for a while but were soon back in business when Duterte left because they’re no longer scared, a resident told me recently.

And there lies the problem. Duterte’s war did not address the source. Perhaps, he thought that if there were no more buyers or peddlers, the supply would stop.

Big business

But of course, it did not. Drugs, like war, is big business and unless one goes after the syndicates behind it, it will remain a menace in our country.

Where do the drugs come from?

There are three possible sources. One is the international syndicates which are behind the supply of methamphetamine hydrochloride, known as shabu or the poor man’s cocaine. This is supposedly manufactured in large-scale laboratories in what is known as the Golden Triangle region of Myanmar, Laos and Thailand.

How do they reach the Philippines? Through transnational crime groups that smuggle drugs into Southeast Asia by sea. It’s easy to bring them to the country with our porous borders.

Then there’s local manufacturing or so-called shabu labs, mostly in the provinces.

Marijuana, meanwhile, is grown locally, especially in mountainous areas like the Cordillera region. The domestic cultivation accounts for a huge part of the marijuana supply in the country, although some are also imported from abroad.

And this is what Duterte’s drug war failed to address. The sources of the drugs that make their way into the streets and homes of users.

Plus, Rody’s bloody war focused on the slum areas, in the dark, dirty alleys of Metro Manila, hitting nameless and helpless victims – druggies and innocents alike.

But there were hardly any raids on homes of celebrities or in the sprawling residences of the well-heeled crowd in gated villages.

The result is a continuing and still unresolved drug surge, up to now.

It does not help that the President, the First Lady and some in their inner circle are perennially accused of using drugs, although they vehemently denied the allegations.

I am also told that these days, in the homes of the rich and the powerful, drug use has become so notorious that cocaine and party drugs are served like beer or whisky.

One regular guest in these high society parties said one has no choice but to try. It’s just like being offered drinks or hors d’oeuvres.

Against this backdrop, the government must take the drug problem seriously and kill it from the source.

Interior and Local Government Secretary Jonvic Remulla, who is considering running for the presidency, can spend the rest of his term with a focus on the drug menace. He can even make that his campaign platform if he decides to run in the 2028 elections.

Through him, the Marcos administration can show the suppliers, the peddlers and the whole drug chain that it is serious in addressing the drug scourge.

It is not enough to showcase drug hauls caught at checkpoints or those intercepted at sea. They must send the perpetrators to jail.

Duterte was right that drugs are destroying the country. It was the method of fighting them that created another tragedy.

I stand with the victims of the drug war and pray they find justice.

Last year, I interviewed Dahlia Cuartero, whose 26-year-old son, Jesus – the third of five children – was killed on March 25, 2019, in an anti-drug police operation in Bulacan, about 80 kilometers from Manila.

For six years, she sought justice. Duterte’s arrest, she said, was the closest she had come to it.

For the sake of families like the Cuarteros – and for the countless lives still at risk – I hope the government will end this social ill that we face, not with blood in the streets, but by placing the masterminds behind bars.

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Email: [email protected]. Follow her on X @eyesgonzales. Column archives at EyesWideOpen on FB.