EDITORIAL : CLUELESS?

INCOMPREHENSIBLE!" Director General Arturo Lomibao of the Philippine
National Police reportedly muttered in disbelief after hearing about
the existence of the drug enclave in Pasig City that was raided by
operatives of the Anti-Illegal Drugs Special Operations Task Force
(Aidsotf) last Feb. 10. But it was not so incomprehensible to the
public: The place could not have operated so openly and flourished
without the protection of influential and powerful people.

People cannot be blamed for thinking so. The drug enclave, known as
the Mapayapa Compound, was located right in the heart of the city,
virtually within spitting distance of a police community precinct, the
Eastern Police District headquarters and Pasig City Hall. Shabu in
various discount packages was being sold there like fake designer
clothes in a "tiangge" [flea market] and the "goods and services"
available were even advertised on "display menus" together with their
corresponding prices. Patrons could relish their precious buys in
"restaurants" -- inside "VIP rooms," if they wanted -- where they
could rent all the necessary paraphernalia as well.

The place even had its own set of business rules and penalties --
operating almost like a government unto itself. And word about this
"specialty market" had spread far and wide. It was not like a
"talipapa" [wet market] serving the neighborhood. Its clientele came
from different places and from all walks of life, some of them getting
there in Mercedes-Benzes, BMWs and other types of luxury vehicles.

Ironically, the mayor of Pasig City and police officials -- the very
people who, because of their jobs, are expected to be on the lookout
for dangerous crimes and, therefore, should be among the first to know
about them -- were the most clueless about its existence-or so they
now claim. Police Supt. Raul Medina, the city's chief of police who
has since been relieved of his post, admitted to complete ignorance.
"Blangko talaga ako dito," he said. And Mayor Vicente Eusebio publicly
scolded "barangay" [neighborhood district] and local police officials
for being "lazy, blind, or worse, in cahoots with those operating the
shabu den"-as if the same things could not be said about him.

Director Vidal Querol, the police chief for Metro Manila, said the
Pasig police had conducted several raids on the place. The last one,
he said, led to the arrest of 18 drug pushers, and that was conducted
only last Jan. 25. These earlier raids and arrests indicated that the
police had "fair knowledge" of the drug trade there, Querol pointed
out. Still, it took a private citizen, an overseas worker, working
with the help of two media personalities, to get the police to conduct
the "explosive raid" on Mapayapa.

Not so very long ago, a spate of police raids dismantled a number of
"shabu," or "crack" [methamphetamine hydrochloride], factories in
different parts of the country, some of them inside plush subdivisions
in Metro Manila. The Arroyo administration trumpeted the raids as
proof that it had regained the upper hand in the fight against the
drug menace. Seeing that it was not an empty claim, the public must
have felt assured. After Mapayapa, we cannot help but wonder what
those past raids have come up to. Have cases been filed and punishment
meted out? Is the illegal drug business really on the wane?

The fact that the Mapayapa drug "tiangge" was able to operate almost
openly and with impunity suggests that drug dealers have kept, or even
worse, widened, their connections. This much Director Anselmo Avenido
of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, who had six agents assigned
to Pasig, conceded: "The drug den could not have lasted this long
without the cooperation of corrupt police officials and men." But how
far up have these connections gone? It's terrifying to think that the
drug menace might have become as widespread and intractable as smuggling.

But, of course, Avenido only echoes what most everybody who should
have known about Mapayapa is not saying: "It's only now that we came
to know about Mapayapa or that the extent of the problem had become
that embarrassing."

Police and city officials can explain all they want. But their
ignorance about an illegal drug trade that had been going on for
months, if not for years, and right in their own backyard is
inexcusable and quite simply incredible.

More so now that Eusebio has ordered the "shabu" market dismantled and
razed to the ground, destroying potential evidence in the process.