Should the case of Busay barangay chairman Amilo Lopez be used as a cautionary tale or a justification to stop the random drug tests conducted on local officials or private citizens for that matter?
Lopez’s test results at a private hospital which showed him negative of drug tests were in sharp contrast to the initial results of a random drug test held during a recent annual assembly of barangay officials that showed him positive of drug use.
When his name came out in newspaper reports, Lopez vehemently objected to the public disclosure and accused the Cebu City Office for Substance Abuse and Prevention (Cosap) for the leak, saying it was politically motivated since he was identified with the opposition Team Rama camp.
Whether it was likely or not that Lopez’s name cropped up as the lone barangay official that tested positive for drug use — Lopez claimed that among the medicines he took for maintenance was Clopidogril, an anti-blood clot prescription drug that could have been mistaken for an illegal drug — Cosap chief Dr. Alice Utlang could have taken measures to prevent the leak and waited for the confirmatory tests to come out before deciding to disclose the details in public.
The police already confirmed that several police officers have been relieved of or transferred from their posts without disclosing their names until charges have been filed in court.
That confidentiality should have been respected during last month’s random drug tests among barangay officials, but whether local media were fed the information or merely received confirmation of Lopez’s test results have yet to be confirmed.
For now, Lopez’s case may serve as a warning to local officials using illegal drugs to quit now while they are ahead, lest they be caught and penalized with far harsher sanctions than being identified as testing positive in a drug test.
That Lopez admitted to the public that disclosure of the drug tests have caused him no small amount of humiliation in front of family, friends and constituents shows that local officials like him still value public opinion and integrity despite the many loopholes offered by the law that would justify their continued stay in office and adamant defense of their innocence.
That said, should we stop the conduct of random drug test? If only to ensure that officials and employees in government keep themselves honest and clean before the public, then by all means let us continue doing it.
But processes and tests should be in place not only to remove any doubts of manipulation of results but also to make sure that every opportunity will be made to verify and double check that the results are accurate.
At the same time, confidentiality should be respected regardless of one’s political affiliation until confirmatory tests prove the person’s drug use.
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