90% OF CAR DRUG USERS NEUTRALIZED IN 8 MONTHS

CAMP DANGWA -- The Police Regional Office in the Cordilleras reported
that over 90 percent or 215 of the original 238 drug users and pushers
identified in the region as of June 16 last year have already been
neutralized.

However, another 31 illegal drug users and pushers have also been
newly-identified since then, raising the total number of known
suspects as of February 15 this year to 54.

This was aside from the clearing of over 88 percent of all reported
drug-affected barangays within the Cordilleras during that same
eight-month period and the identification of 11 other newly-affected
barangays since then.

From mid-June last year up to yesterday, Chief Supt. Rowland Albano,
PRO-CAR director, said a total of P275,698,910 worth of marijuana and
shabu have also been either confiscated or destroyed by the PNP and
allied forces.

With Albano at the Kapihan sa Camp Dangwa were Dr. Teresita Bonuan,
Department of Health regional director; Supt. Danilo Flordeliza,
Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency regional director; Senior Supt.
Rodrigo Licudine, PRO-Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR) deputy
director for operations; lawyer Armando Velasco, Commission on
Elections regional director; Supt. Rogelio Mejia of the Bureau of Fire
Protection regional office; and Dr. Edwin Baclig of the Department of
Health-CAR, among others.

"But our region, according to statistics, remains to have the lowest
number of identified drug users in the country," Albano said, despite
the Cordilleras reputedly being a major transshipment point in the
Philippines.

Licudine said of the P275,698,910 worth of assorted illegal drugs
either confiscated or destroyed in the said eight-month period,
P268,113,300 worth of assorted marijuana plants, seedlings, leaves and
seeds were destroyed in 19 separate eradication operations conducted
by personnel of the different provincial police offices.

This was made up of 1,037,487 fully-grown cannabis sativa or Indian
Hemp plants with a Dangerous Drugs Board market value of P207,497,400;
1,513,210 half-grown seedlings worth P60,528,400; two kilograms of
dried marijuana leaves worth P50,000; and one-and-a-half kilos of
seeds worth P37,500.

"Likewise, P7,585,210 worth of shabu or metamphetamine hydrochloride
and dried marijuana leaves were also confiscated in a series of
anti-narcotic operations conducted by the different PPOs and the
Baguio City Police Office," Albano added.