MANILA – The Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) belied on Monday the claim of former president Rodrigo Duterte that President Marcos was in the watchlist of the agency.
PDEA was reacting to the statement of Duterte that he was shown of the agency’s watchlist containing the name of Marcos when he was still the mayor of Davao City.
“The Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) categorically states that President Ferdinand R Marcos, Jr is not in its watch list, contrary to the statement of former President Rodrigo Duterte,” the PDEA statement read.
“From its inception in 2002 and up to the present, President Ferdinand R Marcos, Jr was never in our NDIS (National Drug Information System),” it added.
The NDIS is the intelligence database of all drug personalities, gathering inputs from counterparts in both law enforcement and intelligence agencies.
The intelligence database was based on the Republic Act 9165, or The Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002, which mandates PDEA to regularly conduct intelligence workshops in collaboration with other law enforcement agencies to update the NDIS.
The PDEA is the country’s lead agency in the campaign against illegal drugs.
The administration of Duterte was known for an aggressive campaign against illegal drugs which resulted in the death of more than 6,000 suspected illegal; drugs personalities.
The same operations also left over a hundred of collateral damage, including minors who were caught in the crossfire, while human rights groups said thousands more were killed by vigilante groups that were inspired by the drug war.
Duterte’s drug war is now the subject of the investigation of the International Criminal Court (ICC).
PDEA also recognized that then president Duterte came up with a narco-list in 2016 that included several personalities such as policemen, politicians and those in the judiciary.
PDEA said the name of President Marcos was not also in that list.
“Based on all the foregoing facts, the PDEA asserts that President Marcos, Jr is not and was never in its watch list,” the statement read.
