RELEASE REWARD MONEY TO DRUG INFORMANTS

A lawyer threatened to go to court yesterday to compel the Philippine
Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) to release millions of pesos in reward
money to his four clients who were informants in the recently busted
shabu laboratories.

Lawyer Reynaldo Bagatsing said he will file a case against PDEA
officials if they continue withholding the reward money despite
repeated pleadings from the drug informants.

Bagatsing is representing the drug informants identified only by their
aliases -- Big Brother, Jimboy, AB and Magdangal.

Big Brother is the informant in the busted shabu laboratory in Tanza,
Cavite; Jimboy at the Marina Bayhomes in Paranaque; AB at the
Lancaster Suites in Pasay City; and Magdangal worked for the
neutralization of a shabu warehouse in Valenzuela City.

The four operations resulted to the arrest of drug ring leader,
Jackson Dy and the recovery of P8 billion worth of shabu and equipment
and raw materials.

Under the PDEA's Private Eye reward program, an informer would earn 10
percent of the value of the seized goods.

Since June last year, the informants have been asking for the release
of their rewards, which is close to P14 million based on their own
computations, but PDEA officials are reportedly giving them a
run-around. This prompted them to hire Bagatsing.

PDEA Director Anselmo Avenido said the delay in the release of the
money was due to the informants' refusal to appear before a six-man
committee overseeing the reward program.

Avenido said the informants' presence is necessary to make sure that
the reward money goes to the right persons since a number of claimants
have surfaced to claim the reward money.

The PDEA director assured that the P62.5 million reward money allotted
for the program is intact and in the bank.

Bagatsing pointed out, however, that he advised his clients not to
appear before the PDEA reward board as their security might be
jeopardized.

He stressed that under the Private Eye program, informants are only
asked to mention their code and present their Information Report Form
(IRF) and they would immediately receive payment for their role in the
busting of drug syndicates.

Bagatsing said there are competent persons whom the PDEA can interview
with regards to the propriety of his clients' claims and not the drug
informers themselves whose lives "could be placed in peril if their
identities would be known."

He said the Arroyo administration has been using the successful
anti-drug operations in her political campaign for the May elections
but fails to address the problem of drug informers, who suffer in
silence along with their families.