THE Philippine Government is now closely coordinating with its foreign counterparts to track the people behind the illegal shipment of multi-billion-peso worth of illegal drugs in the country, MalacaƱang said Saturday, August 11.
Amid President Rodrigo Duterte's "relentless and chilling" anti-narcotics drive, Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque Jr. guaranteed that authorities are doing their best to go after big-time drug suppliers who are "becoming bolder with a dwindled local supply."
"We view the latest reported foreign drug shipment as a sign that big-timer drug manufacturers and smugglers are becoming bolder with a dwindled local supply, as they feel pressure from the government's campaign against illegal drugs," Roque said in a statement.
"Our authorities are now working with their foreign counterparts to help with the probe," he added.
Roque made the remark after Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) director general Aaron Aquino revealed Friday, August 10, that a ton of shabu could have already been circulating around the country.
Aquino's statement came after Pdea agents on Thursday, August 9 discovered four magnetic lifters empty of illegal drugs at a warehouse in General Mariano Alvarez town in Cavite.
He said drug-sniffing dogs traced about a ton of shabu, with an estimated value of P6.8 billion, in the empty hollow parts of the massive steel devices seized in Cavite.
The PDEA chief said the seized magnetic lifters in Cavite were identical to two magnetic lifters used to smuggle 500 kilos of suspected methamphetamine hydrochloride (shabu) worth P4.3 billion recovered at the Manila International Container Port on August 7.
Aquino alluded that the illegal drugs contained in the seized magnetic lifters in Cavite were successfully smuggled and could already be making its way into the streets.
He suspected that drug syndicates from Taiwan were behind the shipment and used Malaysia as a transshipment point.
The new shabu shipment in the country was discovered despite Duterte's bloody crackdown on illegal drugs that has killed thousands of individuals allegedly involved in rampant narcotics trade.
In May 2017, authorities also seized 605 kilograms of shabu worth P6.4 billion from China that slipped past the Bureau of Customs and were found in a warehouse in Valenzuela City.