Palma: We can make it happen

Cebu Archbishop Jose Palma and PRO-7 Director Noli Taliño lead the launching of the Cebu Archdiocesan Program for Drug Dependents at the San Pedro Calungsod chapel at the South Road Properties. (CDN PHOTO/TONEE DESPOJO)

Cebu Archdiocese launches program for drug dependents

From just two programs, the Archdiocese of Cebu has tread the extra mile to reach out and help more drug dependents overcome their addiction.

The country’s biggest archdiocese on Tuesday launched its Cebu Archdiocesan Program for Drug Dependents (CAPDD), forging a partnership with barangay captains, the police, and other agencies of government for the rehabilitation of drug surrenderers throughout the city and province of Cebu.

“We are doing this not for anything else but for the simple reason that we care. We want to make drug surrenderers feel that they are not left behind. It’s a question of just simply making the first step, and we know that we can make it happen if we want to,” said Cebu Archbishop Jose Palma in an interview.

Palma, 66, led the program’s formal launch and orientation activity at the social hall of the San Pedro Calungsod chapel at the South Road Properties (SRP) in Cebu City yesterday afternoon.

“The idea is to replicate these programs (SuGod and Labang). We want to have similar programs throughout the archdiocese. We now have the template. We understand what to do, and it’s important to start,” Palma said.

“We know very well that even if there is just one drug surrenderer who changes his or her life for the better, there will be great rejoicing in heaven,” he said.

Chief Supt. Noli Taliño, Police Regional Office in Central Visayas (PRO-7) director, promised to fully support the Church’s program to reach out to drug dependents.

No capability

The police general, who attended yesterday’s event, admitted that several drug surrenderers returned to their old ways after yielding to the police because there was no extensive program to rehabilitate them.

“The Philippine National Police has no capability of undertaking drug rehabilitation for surrenderers, and many of them just go back to what they used to do because nothing happened to them. I think the time has come for us to unite in order to help drug dependents,” Taliño said.

“PRO-7 gives the archdiocese its 101 percent support in this endeavor. Illegal drugs is the mother of all crimes, and we know the enormity of the problem. The PNP is here to do its share,” he said.

The event included an orientation, which was attended by police officers, priests and local government officials. (CDN PHOTO/TONEE DESPOJO)

From July 1 to Jan. 30 — the time when President Rodrigo Duterte prohibited all policemen from conducting anti-drug operations over a controversy, 106,980 drug pushers and users surrendered to the police in the region.

In Nov. 2016, Palma called for a meeting of different sectors to formulate a program for drug dependents. A series of meetings identified two existing programs which could serve as template for the CAPDD: SuGod and Labang.

Choose program

Bishop Villarojo, who oversees the CAPDD, said parish priests or team moderators could choose which of the programs to use as template in establishing their own scheme.

“You can choose either Labang or SuGod or adopt both. You can also choose to do nothing —sit back and enjoy while others do the work. However, you can be answerable to God,” he said.

Aside Taliño, present during the event were Cebu Auxiliary Bishop Dennis Villarojo; parish priests; police station chiefs and other officials; and barangay captains in the province and city of Cebu.

Fe Barino of the Surrender to God, a center-based drug rehabilitation program based in Liloan town, was also present together with Fr. Carmelo Diola, the lead convenor of the Labang (Lahat Bangon) drug rehabilitation program from which the archdiocese will pattern its province-wide program for drug dependents.