Duterte’s Oplan Tokhang flawed – PNP chief

By Christopher Lloyd Caliwan, Philippine News Agency

MANILA – Philippine National Police (PNP) chief Gen. Nicolas Torre III on Friday described Oplan Tokhang, the flagship anti-drug campaign of the previous Duterte administration, as a flawed operation marred by falsehood.

“I believe that Oplan Tokhang in its most basic concept is flawed. Flawed in the sense that it shows how misinformation can start inside our own house,” said Torre during the oath-taking of officers of the PNP Press Corps event on Wednesday night held at Camp Crame.

Under the Oplan Tokhang, PNP operatives are supposed to knock on the doors of drug suspects and ask them to stop their illegal activities.

However, critics of the Duterte administration said the operation was just a cover wherein the drug suspects are killed outright.

Activist and human rights groups have said more than 30,000 perished from alleged shootouts with law enforcement authorities, including those who were victims of extrajudicial killings.

The previous administration, however, put the figure at a more conservative 6,200 drug traffickers and users killed.

Torre also said ‘tokhang’ was an illogical concept that should not have been implemented in the PNP in the first place.

“Think about it, we go to someone’s house, knock on the door, beg the suspected lawbreakers to stop, yet do we have the evidence,” Torre said.

If there is strong evidence, the PNP chief said police officers have no business pleading with suspected criminals.

“Our job is to bring the warrant whether it is a search warrant or warrant of arrest and enforce the criminals and haul them to jail,” he explained.

Police officers who enforced ‘tokhang’, Torre said, also committed crimes such as slander and harassment.

He also added the measure was a policy with so-called evidence anchored on rumors that only created noise, stoked fear, and eroded public trust in institutions.

Torre also took potshots at Senator Ronald dela Rosa, Duterte’s first PNP chief and architect of the war on drugs.

Taking one of dela Rosa’s infamous remarks on the death of a three-year-old girl who was killed in an anti-drug operation in Rodriguez, Rizal in 2019, Torre said Duterte’s supporters should not sow false information on the killings under the former president’s term.

“Let us be clear, the deaths of drug war victims are not as someone famously shrugged as ‘shit happens.’ Each was a human life,” said Torre.

De Lima, PNP, CHR meet

Meanwhile, Mamamayang Liberal party-list Rep. Leila De Lima met with Torre in Camp Crame on Friday to discuss transitional justice for victims of Duterte’s bloody anti-narcotics campaign.

“Its central aim is to achieve a closure doon sa mga pangyayayari during the past administration’s murderous war on drugs. There’s got to be a closure, but it has to start with truth-telling (Its central aim is to achieve a closure with what happened during the past administration’s murderous war on drugs. There’s got to be a closure, but it has to start with truth-telling.),” de Lima said in a phone interview with reporters after the meeting.

“In fact, the PNP itself should be open. They must be open to investigations,” she stressed.

Asked how the PNP chief responded to her proposal, de Lima said Torre was “very open” to it.

A long-time vocal critic of Duterte’s bloody anti-narcotics campaign, de Lima agreed with Torre: “Bago ka humarap sa isang suspected offender, kailangan mayroon ka nang ebidensya (Before you face a suspected offender, you have to have evidence).”

“Hindi kasi yun ginawa sa Tokhang eh. Basta-basta na lang pupunta. Kung ano-anong mga teams, which were converted, in most cases, into death squads. Hindi na yun tama kasi hindi dumaan sa tamang proseso (That wasn’t what happened with Tokhang. Police just went to houses on a whim. Many different teams were formed, which were converted, in most cases, into death squads. That’s not right because it did not go through the right process),” she added.

According to de Lima, she and the PNP chief also discussed compensation for drug war victims.

Republic Act 7309 established the Board of Claims under the Department of Justice (DOJ), providing up to PHP10,000 in compensation for victims of unjust imprisonment, detention or violent crimes.

De Lima, a former justice secretary, said she plans on filing a bill in the House of Representatives to raise the amount of compensation as part of her proposed transitional justice measures.

She added that the meeting also discussed prison reform and unified penitentiary system bills, which she intends to file in the 20th Congress.

De Lima further detailed that she and Torre discussed “in passing” the International Criminal Court (ICC) case against Duterte.

“I pointed out na… we cannot expect the ICC to investigate each and every case of the EJKs (extrajudicial killings). The lower-level perpetrators, kasama na yung mga miyembro ng mga death squad, the PNP team ay kailangan domestic mechanisms of accountability (We cannot expect the ICC to investigate each and every case of the EJKs. The lower-level perpetrators, including the members of the death squad, the PNP team, need to be subjected to domestic mechanisms of accountability),” she said.

Also at the meeting were National Police Commission Vice Chairperson and Executive Officer Rafael Calinisan and Commission on Human Rights Chairperson Richard Palpal-latoc.