The Duterte administration’s bloody war on drugs was not a legitimate law enforcement policy, contrary to what its supporters believe, Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Juan Ponce Enrile said.

Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Juan Ponce Enrile (Mark Balmores/MANILA BULLETIN)

In a Facebook post on Saturday, Feb. 1, the centenarian law expert and former defense minister stressed that to his recollection, the country’s “anti-drug law did not authorize killing suspected people with impunity.”
 

“Many of the former PRRD followers are advocates and supporters of strong arm style of government,” he wrote.
 

“They think that the PRRD drug war was a legitimate law enforcement policy. It was not,” he added.
 

Enrile stressed that “No Congress under our constitutional law ever authorized summary killings of suspected people.”
 

“Even criminals caught red-handed are not authorized by law to be killed summarily unless they resisted with violence,” he pointed out.
 

Enrile noted that “police power in this country is not licensed to kill suspected people with impunity” because the police are “generally controlled” by the law and due process.
 

“Our Constitution abhors the death penalty,” he stated.
 

When former president Rodrigo Duterte faced congressional hearings last year on his administration’s war on drugs campaign, he admitted to ordering policemen to coax drug suspects to fight back to give the police license to kill.
 

The former chief executive is also the subject of an International Criminal Court (ICC) investigation on alleged crimes against humanity.
 

In a separate Facebook post last month, Enrile quoted pages 21 and 22 of the book “Beyond Will & Power” by author and lawyer Earl Parreño.
 

The author recalled a conversation with Duterte, who was then Davao City mayor and had just decided to run for president, about his plan to order the killing of 5,000 drug lords in his first six months in office.
 

When he was asked who would kill the drug lords, the then mayor answered it would be the police.
 

But when again questioned about the possibility of the police following the order, Duterte was said to have replied, “Sila atong patyon,' again, conveying with his eyes a child-like naughtiness. (Well, let's kill the police).”
 

Enrile, in quoting the book, addressed the former president.
 

“So, I ask you, Sir, with due respect, whether the underlined words on pages 21 and 22 of Atty. Earl Parreño's book, Beyond Will & Power, are the bases, backdrop, and underpinnings of your presidential policy of war on drugs, or were they merely your jokes?,” he asked.
 

“If they were merely your jokes, what then, Sir, again with due respect, were the rational or raison d'etre of your war on drugs?,” he said.
 

The official, who would be turning 101 years old on Feb. 14, recalled that he advised President Marcos not to allow the ICC to interfere in the enforcement of domestic laws.
 

Enrile explained that he posed these questions because of the Bill of Rights under the Philippine Constitution that stated no person should be deprived of liberty and the oath of office Duterte took, wherein he promised to “preserve and defend its Constitution, execute its laws, do justice to every man, and consecrate myself to the service of the Nation.”