PNP chief won’t dispute survey
Director General Ronald dela Rosa, chief of the Philippine National Police (PNP), said he will not dispute a recent Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey showing that majority of the Filipinos believe that only poor people are dying in the anti-drugs war.
Dela Rosa said he could not blame the people for having such a perception since the reality dictates that there are more poor people who are into pushing drugs.
“You have to understand the structure of the drug pyramid. The rich drug lords are on top of the pyramid while those in the streetlevel pushing are the poor,” said Dela Rosa.
“So when we conduct buy-bust operations, most likely we would get the poor because we are talking about the numbers. There are a lot of poor drug pushers,” he added.
While admitting that most of the casualties in the anti-drugs war are poor, Dela Rosa said the public should not also forget some drug lords who were killed in the operations. He cited the case of Ozamiz City Mayor Reynaldo Parojinog and Albuera, Leyte Mayor Rolando Espinosa.
He said critics should also analyze the data on the illegal drugs problem before riding on the issue.
By data analysis, Dela Rosa is referring to the drug pyramid where the poor are at the frontline of pushing illegal drugs on the streets.
Dela Rosa also maintained that those who died in the police operations indeed fought it off with the policemen. The latest data is that more than 3,800 suspected drug pushers and users have been killed since July last year.
On claims that the drug suspects were executed, Dela Rosa said those are farfetched since more than 85 cops have been killed while more than 200 were wounded in the antidrug war, the latest data shows.
In a related story, the results of a Social Weather Stations (SWS) special report released Tuesday found that nearly half of Filipinos mistakenly believe that the use of illegal drugs is a crime punishable by death.
In the nationwide survey conducted among 1,200 respondents, 47 percent of Filipinos think that using illegal drugs is a crime punishable by death, while 53 percent said it is not true.
Philippine law currently does not impose the death penalty for any criminal offense, as capital punishment was effectively abolished on June 30, 2006 during the term of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
Metro Manila had the lowest proportion of respondents who believed that illegal drug use is punishable by death, with 39 percent. This is followed by the rest of Luzon with 44 percent, and the Visayas and Mindanao, each with 52 percent.
The survey also found that 59 percent mistakenly believe that selling of illegal drugs is punishable by death, while 41 percent said it is not true.
SWS said there is no by-area differences in terms of the belief that selling illegal drugs is punishable by death, with 61 percent in the Visayas, 59 percent in Metro Manila, and 58 percent each in the rest of Luzon and Mindanao. (With a report by Ellalyn de Vera-Ruiz)