“I
used to have a drug problem, now I make enough money.” DAVID LEE ROTH
By
Alex P. Vidal
EVEN
if they will kill him, authorities can’t force big time drug lord Peter Co to
name his associates in various regions all over the country, even if he and 19
other fellow drug lords have been transferred from the New Bilibid Prison in
Muntinlupa City to the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) headquarters.
Veteran
drug lords like Co are trained not to rat against their partners even if they
have been cornered by authorities.
If
they do, the consequences are fatal: they are usually liquidated by their own
partners.
Several
days after Co, et al have been caught living in extravagant lifestyle in their
kubols, authorities still failed to extract damning evidence that would pin down the drug lords’ cohorts
operating in various parts of the country.
NBA
agents confiscated from Co’s kubol several dollar bills, high-powered firearms,
shabu and drugs paraphernalia during a joint raid conducted by the NBI and the
Department of Justice on December 15.
BIG
TIME
Peter
Co, Hans Chua, and Tony Co are reportedly among the most big time drug lords in
the country detained at the national penitentiary.
The
raid reportedly confirmed reports that they have been continuing with their
illegal activities in cahoots with corrupt jail guards and some Bureau of
Correction (BuCor) officials.
Philippine
Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) Region 6 Director Paul Ledesma has confirmed
that some of the major supplies of shabu being peddled in Western Visayas came
from the National Bilibid Prison.
Ledesma
knows that drug lords in “Munti” have links with drug pushers in Western
Visayas.
Ledesma
believes that the raid would affect the supplies of shabu in Western Visayas,
which includes Iloilo, Bacolod, Guimaras, Capiz, Aklan, and Antique.
If
“Munti” is the source of the big chunk of shabu that supplies drug addicts in
the region, does it mean that a shabu laboratory exists inside the country’s
premier rehabilitation center?
Or
probably the drug lords, using their communication gadgets, operated the shabu
business by a long distance—meaning the laboratories could be located in secret
places far away from the Bilibid.
PINPOINT
Ledesma
has pinpointed Peter Co as the contact persons of drug suppliers in the region.
They
are expected to subject him in a thorough interrogation under the NBI custody,
but they can never make him confess that he was still doing his illegal
business while behind bars.
In
a recent interview over DyRI RMN-Iloilo, Ledesma predicted a “domino effect.”
“(but)
It will not be immediate. We also have to consider that they still have
stocks,” Ledesma said.
“It’s
just a matter of time…either mapangdakop namon ang mga pushers or maubos
baligya ang supply sa mga retailers. Siguro ang mga replenishment or
transactions in the future ang maapektuhan sang scarcity.”
With
his vast knowledge of what had been going on in the Bilibid, Ledesma and the
entire PDEA should have intercepted some of the major deals undertaken by the
drug lords with their Western Visayas contacts even before the NBI and DOJ raid
last December 15.
Why
did they fail to monitor the deals when it was easier for them then to clamp
down on the drug lords’ clandestine operations inside a state-run jail?
No comments:
Post a Comment