Abusing Oplan Tokhang

The closed- circuit television camera footage showed policemen in civilian clothes entering an office and then planting drugs in the desk drawers of employees, who were subsequently apprehended on drug charges.

Sen. Panfilo Lacson presented the CCTV footage during the Senate hearing yesterday on the kidnapping and murder of South Korean business executive Jee Ick-joo. Lacson, a former Philippine National Police chief, presented the video to illustrate the threat posed by certain PNP members to the credibility of President Duterte’s campaign against illegal drugs.

Lacson played the video just days after the head of an anti-crime watchdog in the Chinese-Filipino community revealed that at least 11 “tokhang for ransom” cases had been recorded in the past months, all of them involving Chinese victims. Teresita Ang-See disclosed this following the confirmation of the “tokhang for ransom” case involving Jee, with the suspects belonging to the PNP Anti-Illegal Drugs Group or AIDG.

President Duterte, enraged by Jee’s murder, has promised justice for the Korean and the heaviest punishment for the perpetrators. The President’s rage must be supported by the speedy prosecution of those responsible, and a solution of the case that will include everyone involved.

This must be complemented by a thorough housecleaning in the PNP, starting with its procedures and requirements for recruitment. PNP applicants must pass a psychiatric examination, but the test must have missed the principal suspect in Jee’s murder, Special Police Officer 3 Ricky Sta. Isabel. It takes a psychopath to kill a man by putting his head in a plastic bag, wrapping it with packing tape and making him choke to death. If the accusations are accurate, Sta. Isabel strangled Jee to death in the Korean’s own vehicle near the AIDG office at Camp Crame, headquarters of the PNP.

How many more police officers have committed such a heinous offense in the name of the war on drugs? Jee’s case as well as AngSee’s revelation should embolden other victims of Oplan Tokhang abuses to come out and seek justice. The government must not disappoint them. And it should move to prevent a repeat of the abuses.