Here’s more proof of farcical drug war

Google-search shabu busts in July 2016-June 2019. Excel file them into date, seized volume, value, reporting agency, location.

Check also PDEA’s Facebook page. Avoid double entries.

Contrast the research with PDEA’s #RealNumbersPH, 1 July 2016 to 30 June 2019, 156 weeks:

• 134,583 anti-drug operations;

• 193,086 drug personalities arrested;

• 421,724 surrendered;

• 7,054 high-value targets arrested;

• 334 drug dens dismantled;

• 14 clandestine labs dismantled;

• 55 percent of 42,044 barangays cleared;

• 5,526 drug personalities killed;

• P34.75 billion worth of various drugs seized;

• P25.99 billion shabu seized;

• 4,409.69 kilos of shabu seized.

Note the differences:

PDEA’s #RealNumbersPH states 4,409.69 interdicted kilos of shabu. News and PDEA Facebook reports for the same period add up to 5,311.104 kilos.

The 901.414-kilo difference is explainable. Likely, the onsite weigh-ins after buy-busts or raids were higher because rushed, compared to careful lab weighing.

Too, #RealNumbersPH states P25.99 billion worth of shabu seized. News and PDEA FB reports add up to P31,670,553,400.

The P5.68-billion excess is explainable too. Shabu value fluctuates depending on supply, area and grade.

Example: 1,618.8 kilos of shabu in four magnetic lifters slipped past authorities in General Mariano Alvarez, Cavite in August 2018. Greater Manila supply suddenly ballooned. Drug lords and street pushers hurriedly sold low. But shabu rates remained high in other regions, even if poorer grade.

But here’s where the numbers get weird:

(a) #RealNumbersPH states 134,583 anti-drug operations that netted 4,409.69 kilos, worth P25.99 billion.

Yet only 55 news and PDEA FB reports add up to more than that volume and value.

134,583 minus 55 equals 134,528.

Where did the volume of shabu from 134,528 other anti-drug operations go? What was the value?

It could be in the hundreds of thousands or millions of kilos. Worth hundreds of billions or trillions of pesos.

The whopping amount leads to suspicion that the shabu was recycled into the black market.

Recall what PNP Drug Enforcement Group Col. Romeo Caramat said on Nov. 28, 2019: “Three million addicts each snort one gram of shabu a week – totaling 3,000 kilos, worth P25 billion a week. Drug syndicates won’t easily give up because it’s big business.”

The P25-billion weekly narco-trade translates to P3.9 trillion in three years or 156 weeks. Very tempting for the lowest ninja cop to the highest presidential special economic adviser.

(b) Most of the 55 busts involve one to three druggies. The few that exceeded a hundred kilos involved five to ten gangsters. Even if each of the 55 involved ten narco-traders, that’s 550 apprehended or slain.

So why were 5,526 killed? Was it for quota and reward?

Why were 193,086 drug personalities arrested? Was it for “palit ulo,” that is, releasing a suspect but recycling his shabu, in exchange for his implicating a cohort then recycling the latter’s shabu too?

(c) If it took only 55 operations to interdict 4,409/5,311 kilos, why were 5,526 killed – again for quota and reward?

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