Sunday, January 14, 2007 P86.4M marijuana destroyed in Benguet-Ilocos Sur border
AN ESTIMATED P86.4 million worth of marijuana plants was reportedly uprooted and burned by a composite government team along the boundary of Benguet and Ilocos Sur.
Chief Superintendent Leopoldo Bataoil, director of Police Regional Office (PRO) 1, said this resulted after combined personnel of the PRO-1 Mobile Group (MG) and the Santol Municipal Police Station jumped off for a three-day operation that started at around 1 p.m. last January 9.
The troops were dispatched to raid a first plantation covering about 1,500 square meters with approximately 24,000 fully-grown marijuana plants measuring an average of six feet tall along the disputed boundary of Bakun, Benguet and Alilem, Ilocos Sur.
They moved to a second and third plantation that same night and also destroyed an estimated 450,000 fully-grown cannabis sativa hemp plants. The total haul for the day, which has an approximate Dangerous Drugs Board (DDB) value of P86.4 million, was reportedly burned on sight.
This developed after Bataoil and La Union Governor Victor Ortega, along with the commander of the Philippine Army's 503rd Brigade, the provincial director of the La Union Provincial Police Office, the group director of the PRO-1 MG, the head of the Regional Anti-Illegal Drugs Special Operations Task Force and Mayor Floresto Sayangda of Santol, La Union, accompanied by some media personalities went to Sitio Bay-o, Sabsaba, Santol, La Union, on board two Armed Forces helicopters and conducted an aerial survey at more or less two hectares of scattered marijuana plantations with around 30,000 fully-grown plants estimated at P6 million.
Antonio Villar Jr., presidential adviser on local governance, personally called Bataoil on Saturday to commend his operatives for a job well done and for their relentless operations on marijuana eradication.
