The Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) has distributed more than P10 million cash to 13 confidential informants who helped the agency in the conduct of 22 successful anti-drug operations in various parts of the country.
PDEA Director General Wilkins M. Villanueva handed out the monetary incentives to the informants who wore masks to conceal their identities and were identified only through their code names.
Under PDEA’s ‘Operation Private Eye (OPE)’, Villanueva explained that it is a citizen-based information collection program designed to encourage the active participation of private individuals to report illegal drug activities in their communities.

“Operation Private Eye” is an incentivized program to embolden the citizenry to come out in the open and report illegal drug activities happening in their neighborhood with guarantees of anonymity, confidentiality and security,” Villanueva said.
Earlier, Villanueva stressed that OPE “is credited to have provided key intelligence in many of PDEA’s high-impact operations (HIOs),’’.
‘Operation Private Eye’ has a counterpart known as ‘Operation: Lawmen’ which is an incentive program for the law enforcers or members of the anti-illegal drug units, teams or task forces including the support units for “the conduct of laudable anti-drug operations.’’
The Private Eye Rewards Committee is composed of members from the academe, non-government organizations, law enforcement, religious and business sectors, who deliberates and approves the granting of cash rewards to confidential informants. (Chito A. Chavez)