Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña is in favor of the plans of the Philippine National Police (PNP) to administer Oplan Tokhang on barangay officials that are on their drug watchlist.
Osmeña said it is only appropriate for law enforcers to conduct an Oplan Tokhang on alleged narco-politicians whose names appeared in the drug watchlist recently revealed by the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA).
“When the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA – 7) was headed by the previous administrator (Yogi Filemon Ruiz), Barangay Ermita officials were suspended including the barangay captain (the late Felicisimo ‘Imok’ Rupinta) and many of them are now councilors. And no one was involved in drugs? I don’t believe that,” Osmeña said.
Among PDEA’s list of alleged narco-politicians in the barangay level, which contains over 200 names, three of them were from Cebu province – Ramonette Durano (former barangay captain of Suba, Danao City), Marc Ferdinand Bas (former barangay captain of Lagtang, Talisay), and Bibiano Cabaron (former barangay captain of Palanas, Ronda, and who is now a Ronda town councilor).
But there was no one from Cebu City on the list, which was a development that Osmeña, in an earlier interview, said surprised him./ Lalaine M. Jurado, CNU Intern