Preferential treatment for alleged big-time drug lords?

Instead of gaining approval for publicly berating alleged drug lord Peter Lim during a meeting recorded by the state-run RTVM in Davao City last week, President Rodrigo Duterte is getting flak from some quarters including netizens who think the Cebu-based businessman is getting preferential treatment because he is a kumpare (fellow sponsor in a wedding) of the sitting President.

Buhay Partylist Representative Lito Atienza captured the common perception around the anti-drugs campaign: “Pag mahirap ang drug offender, patay; pag mayaman, may meeting sa Presidente,” at least that’s how one online news source summarized Rep. Atienza’s take on President Digong’s brutal anti-drugs campaign that flushed out personalities long suspected of having ties with Hong Kong Triad.

Atienza is supportive of the war against drugs but wary why only street-level drug traffickers have been neutralized in apparent summary executions while the three big-time drug lords and their alleged protectors in the PNP whom President Digong publicly shamed are still around with one of them even getting an audience with the Chief Executive.

So Peter Lim will have to submit himself to a probe before the Department of Justice through the National Bureau of Investigation. That would be problematic for the NBI because there is no pending case against Lim.

This could be the angle that emboldened the Cebu businessman to face the President last week since Lim is not facing any charges in court. On top of that, the witnesses who testified against him and his brother during the congressional probe are all gone. The scenario that contemplates President Digong directing the DOJ to investigate the Peter Lim case anticipates that the agency will come out empty-handed.

However, he falls under the category of a “person of interest” – a term recently used by a Presidential spokesman who announced that the President will name more “persons of interest” involved in the illegal drugs trade. The term is used by the United States law enforcement system to identify someone in a criminal investigation but one who has not been arrested or formally accused of a crime.

If President Duterte is really bent on getting to the bottom of Peter Lim’s alleged underworld activities and if the businessman himself is also resolved to see his name off the list of persons of interest, the suggestion of former Cebu Congressman Antonio “Tony” Cuenco to revisit the House Committee on Dangerous Drugs report on the 2001 congressional hearings is worth studying.

It is both sound and realistic, if I may say so, for the simple reason that the House panel ended the probe with orders issued to the DOJ and other law enforcement agencies. In other words, should Congress reopen the case, Cuenco’s issuances will be a relevant starting point.

From October to December 2001, the House Committee on Dangerous Drugs launched a congressional probe aimed to assess the drug situation in Cebu, but the hearings centered on the activities of Messrs. Peter and Wellington Lim after two of their employees, Bernard Liu and Ananias Dy blew the whistle on their former employers.

After four hearings, the House panel, in its February 19, 2002 report stated that it has found “no proof beyond reasonable doubt” for the crime of illegal drug trafficking by brothers Peter and Wellington Lim.

Cuenco then recommended that all records of the case be handed over to the Department of Justice and for the DOJ to order the National Bureau of Investigation and the Philippine National Police to continue the manhunt for one Ben Go, a Taiwanese businessman, allegedly a cohort of the Lim brothers and is said to hold the key to the solution of the case.

Go is said to be the owner of more than 40 kilos of shabu loaded in a container van shipped to Manila in 1991 but was intercepted by Customs authorities. During the hearing, Peter Lim’s former employees testified that he knew Ben Go, a charge that the Lim brothers strongly denied.

The probe was criticized by some quarters as a political tool, and the report as a matter of saving face for the committee. But Cuenco blamed police authorities for not helping the probe, and he had the media at that time backing his accusations. I can still recall that some police officials ignored the panel’s invitation with some of them preferring to play golf rather than attend committee hearings.

I can’t blame Tony Cuenco for his misgivings on President Digong’s directive for the DOJ and NBI to probe Lim’s alleged drug trafficking activities because these are the same agencies who belittled the House panel when it subjected Lim to a probe in 2001.

Still, there is no other way. Only a painstaking investigation can lead us to the truth.