Osmeña to boot out drug user tanods, loaders

Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña

CEBU City Mayor Tomas Osmeña has made clear a policy.

City-hired workers found positive of illegal drug use will be automatically fired.

“We have to set an environment that people realize, if you start to fool around with drugs, you will be kicked out,” Osmeña said in the heels of surprise drug tests conducted by the city which found several village workers positive for illegal drugs.

At least 50 barangay tanods and garbage loaders from 11 barangays tested positive of illegal drug use during surprise drug tests conducted by the Cebu City Office for Substance Abuse and Prevention (Cosap). The results are still subject to confirmatory tests.

Out of 80 barangays in Cebu City, Cosap has, so far, conducted drug tests on twenty villages.

In a meeting with village officials on Friday, deputy mayor for police matters Cebu City Councilor Dave Tumulak relayed the mayor’s policy on those found using drugs.

“The barangay captains themselves agreed that they will terminate these workers if they are still found positive after confirmatory tests,” Tumulak told reports.

Out of the 11 barangays whose workers tested positive for drug use, Barangay Guadalupe had the most number of drug users at 16 followed by Barangays Labangon (7), Basak San Nicolas (7), Poblacion Pardo (6), Punta Princesa (3), Suba (3), Pahina Central (3), Kisang-an (2), Cogon Pardo (1), Quiot (1) and Santa Cruz (1).

During the meeting, Tumulak revealed to the village chiefs the names of the workers found positive for drugs in their respective barangays.
According to Tumulak, some barangay captains said that they had been suspecting those who yielded positive results in the tests to be using illegal drugs.

In one barangay, employees reportedly tendered their resignations before the test results were out, said Tumulak.

Barangay captains of villages that had yet to be tested were called upon by Tumulak to conduct an internal cleansing among their ranks.

Basak San Nicolas Captain Norman Navarro, whose barangay was found to have seven workers under the influence of drugs, vowed to take immediate action.

“I will ask them to resign for now and we will let them undergo intervention programs for free. The barangay will try our best to be able to provide this for them,” Navarro said.

Navarro added that once these workers have completed their rehabilitation, they may be allowed to apply again in his barangay.

Cosap has been conducting drug tests for loaders and tanods as part of an ongoing performance evaluation of the city’s workers.

Osmeña earlier ordered the suspension of the workers’ incentives pending results of the performance assessment.