Police attack supply, demand sides of illegal drugs in Cebu City

Police in Cebu City particularly members of the Cebu City Police Office-City Intelligence Unit confiscate 180 grams of suspected shabu from a 25-year-old man, whom the CIU operatives considered a high value target during a buy-bust operation in Barangay Labangon, Cebu City on Thursday, Sept. 16. | Photo courtesy of CCPO-CIU

CEBU CITY, Philippines — Police are focusing on two targets in the war against illegal drugs in the city — supply reduction and demand reduction.

Since January this year, they had been concentrating on target-listed drug personalities as their priority targets, said Police Lieutenant Colonel Randy Caballes, chief of the Cebu City Police Office-City Intelligence Unit (CCPO-CIU).

Caballes said that making target-listed personalities as priority targets was part of their supply reduction goal.

He said that with this focus, their operations against these persons were intelligence-driven or plans to catch these persons would be based on the intelligence that they had gathered against their target.

As of today, they already recorded a hundred arrests since January 2021, and around 95 percent of those arrested were target-listed personalities. 

He said that these could be those on the drug personalities watchlist at the regional police, city police, or police station levels.

 Logic of action

He said the logic of going after these listed drug personalities first was to cut off the supply before reaching the streets as much as the police could possibly can.

When targeted personalities will be arrested, the disposers will no longer have their supplies, which will eventually impact on their markets. 

And with no markets, Caballes said that the demand for drugs here would decrease and so would its supply.

“Mga sources, disposers kanang naa sa street level, kung makuha to mas maayo para ang kanang disposers mawad-an na silag supply so any time or period of time makuha ilang supply mawala ilang distribution sa area,” Caballes said.

(It would be better that the sources would be arrested first so that the disposers would no longer have their supply that could be distributed any time and this would also affect their areas of distribution.)

With their continuous operations, police are hoping that they will maintain a decrease in both demand and supply of illegal drugs in the city.

Aside from that, he also said that they were monitoring identified drug dens in Cebu City. 

Every station already received directives from their superiors to monitor their respective areas of jurisdiction for the presence of drug dens.

Aside from those target-listed drug personalities, Caballes said they were also keeping an eye on suspected drug users to reduce demand of illegal drugs, which was the second priority target of the CCPO-CIU.

Police seize P1.2M shabu

Last Thursday, Sept. 16, Cebu City policemen arrested another target-listed drug personality, who was caught with P1.2 million worth of suspected shabu during a buy-bust operation in A. Lopez St., Barangay Labangon, Cebu City.

Caballes identified the suspect as Anthony Zabala, a resident of Barangay Calamba, Cebu City, who was also listed as a high-value individual at the regional level.

He said that the suspect allegedly could dispose around 200 to 300 grams of suspected ‘shabu’ in the city.

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