By Ellson Quismorio
The Duterte administration should just treat Vice President Leni Robredo's report on the anti-illegal drug campaign as "constructive" criticism, said Makabayan lawmaker ACT-Teacher's party-list Representative France Castro, a minority member in the House of Representatives.
ACT-Teachers Party-List Rep. France Castro
(Facebook / File Photo / MANILA BULLETIN)
"This would be very helpful to the admin since the war on drugs is still being implemented," Castro said. "They should take it constructively."
Earlier this week, opposition leader Robredo claimed in a report that only one percent of the annual estimated consumption of illegal drugs had been seized by local authorities in the three years that the administration's all-out drug war has been implemented.
READ MORE: Robredo reports on failure of gov’t anti-drugs war
The Vice President branded the campaign as a failure by this metric. She submitted her report to Malacañang in her capacity as former co-chairperson of the Inter-Agency Committee on Anti-Illegal Drugs (ICAD).
"That was based on her research and investigation through the data provided to her by PNP (Philippine National Police), PDEA (Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency), and other sources," Castro said of Robredo's findings.
Malacañang was quick to dismiss the contents of the report even as Robredo insisted that it was based on government's own figures.
"Tama naman siya (Robredo) na dapat ‘yung mga big drug lords at ‘yung source ang dapat pokusan ng operation ng gobyerno (Robredo is correct in saying that the government should focus its operations on the big drug lords and the source of drugs)," Castro said.
Opposition figures said last year that over 10,000 drug suspects have been killed by law enforcers under the drug war.
Robredo accepted President Rodrigo Duterte's offer for her to co-chair ICAD along with PDEA Director General Aaron Aquino in early November last year. The offer was made in a dare-like fashion after Robredo criticized the ongoing drug campaign.
Less than three weeks later, Duterte sacked her from that post.
READ MORE: ‘VP wasted opportunity’ Duterte fires Robredo as ICAD co-chair