SOME P2.93 million worth of marijuana plants were uprooted in separate operations in La Trinidad and Sablan, Benguet by police Monday, February 17.
Joint personnel of Sablan Municipal Police Station (MPS), Benguet Provincial Police Office (PPO), Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency-Cordillera (PDEA-CAR), Regional Intelligence Unit (RIU) - 14, and National Police Commission (Napolcom) conducted marijuana eradication in four sites with an estimated lot area of 2,380 square meters in Sitio Taleb, Barangay Banangan, Sablan.
Authorities reported there were 10,300 marijuana plants that were destroyed in Sablan amounting to P2,380,000.
In La Trinidad, some 2,750 fully grown marijuana plants with a Dangerous Drugs Board (DDB) value of P550,000 were also destroyed by joint personnel of La Trinidad MPS, Provincial Drug Enforcement Unit (PDEU), Provincial Intelligence Branch (PIB) – Benguet, RIU-14 and PDEA conducted at Sitio Tuba, Barangay Wangal in La Triniad and sighted a four sites with fully grown marijuana plants.
Agent Julius Paderes, PDEA Benguet provincial officer, said authorities intensified its monitoring in La Trinidad and Sablan which resulted to eradication of eight plantation sites.
“It appears La Trinidad is a new area of plantation, however there were first batch of harvest made. Let us reassess the present drug situation in the province of Benguet, because they shifted their modus. From far flung places, they have brought marijuana in the capital town on the prefix that because the capital town of La Trinidad is much near. Nobody expected that there is plantation in La Trinidad,” Paderes said.
Paderes said as of this writing, they are still conducting investigation on the identity of the cultivator while La Trinidad and Sablan MPS will also conduct its own parallel investigation.
To date, he noted there are five villages in the province considered as drug affected, two each in La Trinidad and Kibungan and one in Buguias.