THIS month last year, I warned police authorities in my column (BusinessMirror, October 30) on the negative effect of the frightful body-count syndrome in its bloody antidrug
campaign. Obviously, they just ignored my warning.
As a consequence, no less than the entire Duterte administration is now unfairly reaping the blame for the syndrome now clearly blotched with too much inaccurate and unsubstantiated stories on the drug war in print, broadcast media and in the cyberspace, where the negative viral effects spread faster than sound.
By body count, I mean the number of people killed, wounded, captured and had surrendered had been exploited by misguided politicians, the police and military and some irresponsible members of the media to measure the success of the government’s intensified antidrug campaign.
This was compounded by publicity-seeking police officers who instinctively dramatized and trivialized their role by consciously posing with suspected drug lords, pushers, addicts and dead bodies for the TV screens in the hope of getting promoted or rewarded without realizing the ill-effect of too much media exposure.
Even more reprehensible is their lack of concern on intractable issues that cannot be measured by mathematical quantification, such as the breakdown of morale and discipline; broken homes; how crimes are committed; bad prisons that breed crimes; greedy and ambitious politicians resorting to criminal activities; and the damage to the country’s social, moral and ethical foundation, to cite only a few.
The problem started when a bunch of anti-Duterte propagandists deliberately and willfully came up with an unqualified generalization of the number of people killed in the antidrug war by calling them victims of “extrajudicial killings,” a clever propaganda hyperbole designed to erode President Duterte’s success in regaining the streets from drug lords, pushers, addicts and other scum.
For instance, the erroneous number of 7,000 killed in the drug war “has been raised further to 8,000 by no less than Vice President Leni Robredo’s legal adviser, former Akbayan Representative Ibarra Gutierrez,” according to a report from the Vera Files (VF), a media outfit known for high accuracy and fairness in vetting and reporting news stories.
Here’s an extract of the enlightening VF story: “Robredo’s speech, where she mentions summary executions, was written immediately after her staff received the invitation from the United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs in February to speak about the implications of the war on drugs on human rights.
“This is evident in her video message: ‘It is already February 2017, and the body count due to drug-related killings keeps growing.’”
“At the time of speechwriting, the number of deaths in Oplan Double Barrel Alpha was nowhere near 7,000.
“As of January 12, there had been 2,457 drug suspects killed in police operations, based on PNP [Philippine National Police] data furnished to Vera Files on January 23. On January 30 the PNP suspended its anti-illegal drug operations to cleanse its ranks after the kidnap-slay of Korean businessman Jee Ick-joo by rogue cops.
“Since Project Tokhang resumed on March 6, a total of 2,345 anti-illegal drug operations have been conducted resulting in 54 deaths, based on PNP data.
“While it’s true that more than 8,000 have been killed since President Rodrigo Duterte waged a bloody war on drugs, not all these deaths are drug-related.
“The breakdown: From July 1, 2016, to March 24, 2017, at least 2,609 drug suspects have been killed in what the PNP classifies as legitimate police operations under Oplan Double Barrel Alpha and its revived program, allegedly for resisting arrest.
“As of March 21, there have been at least 6,299 reported deaths outside police operations. Of this number, 4,811 are tagged ‘not cleared,’ or what the police dub as DUIs [deaths under investigations].
“The remaining 1,488 cases have already been considered ‘cleared,’ which could mean at least one of the offenders has been identified, and he or she has been charged before the prosecutor with sufficient evidence.
“Of the 6,299 reported deaths, 5,824 have been identified as homicide cases. Of this number, only 1,370 or 23.5 percent are considered drug-related, while 894 or 15.4 percent are not. Police have yet to determine the motives of at least 3,560 homicide cases, which form the bulk.
“Of 1,433 incidents filed in court, only 105, or 7.3 percent, are attributed to drugs, the rest are labeled non-drug related.
“In total, the Duterte administration records 4,084 drug-related deaths: 1,475 drug-related killings outside police operations and 2,609 deaths under Oplan Double Barrel.
“Philippine laws lack a standard definition of ‘summary execution.’ The UN defines it as the deprivation of life after some sort of legal proceedings, which falls short of national or international minimum procedural standards.”
Imagine if there was no VF story, the erroneous and unsubstantiated reports, obviously meant to undermine the Duterte administration, would have continued to circulate to brainwash our people, particularly the country’s young adults or millennials, some of them often came up with their own biased and convoluted judgment.
Take the experience of Vietnam when some misguided politicians, military generals and irresponsible journalists resorted to body count (number of enemies killed) that merely misled them into believing that the United States was winning the war in Vietnam.
“Body count. That’s one of the more grisly aspects of the Vietnam War that the US military can’t seem to shed, no matter how hard it tries,” said the late Harry G. Summers Jr., the respected military specialist who wrote extensively about the Vietnam War and the Gulf War.
To reach the writer, e-mail cecilio.arillo@gmail.com.