Ruiz, Neil Adrian L.

HUMSS-1 11
Rising Outrage Over Duterte’s War on Drugs in the
Philippines
BY: MONG PALATINO
A reported surge of extrajudicial killings victimizing children
has exacerbated concerns about the campaign.
During his second State of the Nation Address
(SONA) in July, President Rodrigo Duterte
signaled the intensification of the “war on drugs,”
which he defended as necessary and crucial to
fight rampant criminality and corruption across the
country.
• Duterte’s “war on drugs” has been controversial
from the very beginning, since it allegedly
involved the extrajudicial killing of suspected drug
peddlers and users. The anti-drug operation
(Oplan Tokhang) has already killed 7,000
persons, but some human rights groups think
that the number of drug-related killings could
reach 12,000 if we are going to include the
unreported cases.
Police officials have consistently claimed that rival
drug gangs are behind the extrajudicial killings.
They also insisted that state forces are only forced
to retaliate because suspects have been violently
resisting arrests.
Aside from making Tokhang the top priority of his
government, Duterte is accused of abetting
impunity by vowing to protect cops who kill drug
suspects.
Early in 2017, the killing of a Korean businessman
inside a police camp and the backlash it generated
forced the government to suspend Tokhang. But in
a matter of weeks, the killings resumed in poor
urban communities.
 Duterte’s SONA speech worried many because it
was believed that it could lead to more drug-
related deaths instead of addressing the demand
of human rights groups and the international
community to rethink the methods of Tokhang.
And as if on cue, police intensified Tokhang
operations and produced a record number of
killings in a matter of days. A Tokhang operation
on a single night killed 32 drug suspects in
Bulacan province and 26 in the capital Manila.
Duterte praised this operation. “Thirty-two were
killed in a massive raid in Bulacan. That is good. If
we could kill 32 every day, then maybe we could
reduce what ails this country,” he said in a media
interview.
• But the media also reported that a 17-year-old
student was killed by the police during a
Tokhang-related arrest in Caloocan, a northern
suburb of Manila. Later, CCTV footage of the
crime scene showed a boy being dragged by the
police which convinced many that the Tokhang
operation killed another innocent person. The
police were loudly condemned for this atrocity.
Duterte, too, was blamed for inciting police abuse.
The media reminded the public that this is not the first
time that a minor was killed in a Tokhang operation. In
fact, 54 children have been killed already since 2016.
The Senate conducted a probe of the incident; the
powerful Catholic Church issued a strong statement
against drug-related killings; the opposition pinned the
blame on Duterte’s aggressive brand of leadership;
and a funeral protest was held to dramatize the clamor
for justice amid the spate of extrajudicial killings.
A member of Duterte’s Cabinet complained that
the incident is being blown out of proportion. The
police defended itself by releasing a report which
tagged the teenager as a suspected drug courier.
But many continue to express outrage over the
killing of a student.
Sensing a shift in public opinion about Tokhang,
Duterte modified his stance by vowing to punish
rogue cops.

Public anger has yet to subside when a similar

Tokhang case was reported by the media. This
was followed by more news reports highlighting
the tortured bodies of teenagers who allegedly
died while under police custody.
Duterte seemed baffled by the reports and
accused sinister forces of trying to sabotage the
government’s anti-drug campaign. But Duterte’s
problem is his refusal to acknowledge that the
main problem is the framework of Tokhang itself.
The obsession for quick results to end the drug
menace, plus the alleged bounty for every dead
drug operator, probably fueled the brutal killings in
poor communities.
• Compounding Duterte’s woes is the extrajudicial
killing of a Lumad (indigenous people) teenager
in a militarized community in Mindanao, where
Martial Law remains in effect. The issue exposed
the bloody legacy of Duterte’s decision to launch
an “all-out war” against communist rebels instead
of pursuing peace talks.
• Some believe the issue of human rights abuses
involving children is aimed at distracting the
attention of the public after a Senate probe
implicated Duterte’s son in the shipment of illegal
drugs in the country’s ports. It may be true. But it
does not invalidate the urgent demands to rethink
Tokhang, to probe and punish police abuse, and
to make Duterte accountable for the worsening
human rights violations that are taking place
across the country.
References:
https://thediplomat.com,Rising
Outrage Over Duterte’s War on
Drugs in the Philippines , Mong
Palatino
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