Friday, August 5, 2016

Some questions on Duterte's war against drugs

These questions are bugging me since this campaign against criminality began. Deep within me, I feel that Duterte is doing the right thing, and since this is a "war", not merely a campaign, as what Duterte already described it is, there are victors and losers. What we don't know is how many are being caught in the crossfire? How many innocents have died along with the sinners or violators?

We don't know exactly because most of those killed belong to the poorest of the poor--those who do not have the monies to express themselves or those too poor to even think of getting justice from our courts. It would be extremely difficult to coax these victims to talk out of fear that policemen would just gun them down and cut them to pieces.

How many have been victimized by anti-drug elements--those who belong to rich families but are involved in the business of drug pushing? Extortion--how many cases are there? We surely don't know as yet because no one would dignify such questions and no one would posit some answers.

I remember the times when an NBI agent by the name of Martin Soriano preyed on rich drug pushers or drug pushers born with the proverbial silver spoon in their mouths. Soriano's reputation was legendary--he raid their homes and force these rich kids to cough up thousands even millions of pesos with one promise--he would never arrest them if they give him what he wants--protection money.

How many cases are there now? We don't know.

Dont get me wrong--I am not casting aspersions to this anti-drug war. It is just that, in every war, there is always, always some cases of corruption, here and there. It happens--even at the most innocent of situations. When we dismiss these, we are being untrue to ourselves.


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