admin While the Drug Policy Reform Initiative (DPRI) should be lauded for crafting a toolkit for journalists in reporting on illegal drug cases and launching the same on April 21, 2023 at Luxent Hotel in Quezon City, the bigger issue really is why this impoverished country hosts drug users that comprise 2.05% of the entire population, which translates to about 2.4 million people. The Duterte regime worsened the problem after six years of bloody summary executions and bogus arrests.
Indeed, the toolkit is good but reporters must be trained to cast away the demons found in police precincts and cover drug cases with some grok or sympathetic understanding, as what DPRI’s toolkit champions, and take out the bias that drips in the press releases from the Philippine National Police (PNP) and the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA.)
Ayon nga sa mga beteranong police reporters, nakakahawa ang style ng pulisya kaya pati ang coverage sa mga crime incidents ay “pagresponde” na parang pulis na rin ang mga nagkokober para sa mga pahayagan, radyo at telebisyon.
This distinction between police and journalists must be observed, which means reporters must not be toting guns on the prowl, and, as the Camp Crame joke says, the PNP must continue to be “national in scope, civilian in nature and police in character.”
Understandably, PDRI seeks to put humanity in the coverage of drug cases as well as guarantee the respect for human rights of the detainees and suspected couriers and drug dealers.
The toolkit cites examples of crude news reports by journalists who seek to solve the crime quickly and assail the character of a murdered minors, asking if they knew that their sons or nephews were into drugs and were robbing people and taxi drivers.
Sa halip na maintindihan ang kaso, ang tinatangay na anggulo ay mula sa typewriter ni sarhento. Kaunting sipag lang naman ang kailangan upang masipat kung wasto ba ang paghuli at hindi itinanim ang droga, patalim at revolver na kalawangin.
In the course of the launch of the DPRI toolkit, iminungkahi ng isang beteranong journalist na pag-aralang masinsinan ang krisis sa droga, tuntunin kung saan nanggagaling ang precursor chemicals sa paggawa ng shabu at pati na rin ng fentanyl na ayon sa huling balita ay pawang gawa sa China at nilalako na rin ng mga taga Vietnam.
Ang pamahalaan mismo ay nararapat na sinasabihan ang China na puksain ang mga kompanyang gumagawa ng precursor chemicals. Pinalalabas na gagamitin sa paggawa ng T-shirts, tiles at medisina ang mga chemicals na ito.
Bukod dito, ilang bang Chinese chemists at chemical engineers ang pumapasok sa bansa? The technique for manufacturing shabu is controlled by Chinese drug syndicates and no Filipinos are allowed to do the mixing and preparation of these chemicals. The PNP, PDEA and the Bureau of Immigration (BI) could easily find these Chinese, mostly overstaying, with some even possessing Philippine passports.
Drug addiction is not only a social and economic issue since it is a disease, with prolonged shabu and fentanyl affecting the brain stem and hindering the transmission of signals to areas of the brain responsible for the sense of smell, hearing and sight. Addiction is listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-5 (DSM-5) as a disease and drug rehabilitation requires prolonged treatment.
A comprehensive rehab program is needed to reduce the number of drug dependents but what is also required is for drug dependents to recognize their ailment and commit themselves to treatment.
On this score, they might as well look to Viktor Frankl’s logotherapy, which he developed while languishing in a Nazi concentration camp. Patients who vow to treat themselves eventually recover.
Aside from protesting against the cabbage system of enveloping Philippine areas in the South China Sea (SCS), Manila should protest against the Chinese drug lords, chemists and distributors that control the shabu trade. Doing so and publishing these protests in all media outlets would certainly internationalize the issue just as Mexico did and other countries are now doing. China cannot bully the truth.
Hindi ba kaya ni Xi Jinping na masakote ang mga drug rings sa China? O baka naman extension na rin ng foreign policy ng Beijing ang pagpapalaganap ng droga.
