Five Dagupan barangays declared drug-free
WAR ON DRUGS CONTINUES
FIVE barangays of Dagupan City have already been cleared by the Dagupan City Police Station of illegal drugs: Mamalingling, Salisay, Tebeng, Mangin and Pogo Grande.
Also cleared, according to P/Supt. Neil Miro, acting-chief of police, three problematic sitios — Aling in Barangay Pantal, Silungan in Bonuan Binloc and Tondaligan in Bonuan Gueset.
Miro disclosed the latest developments during the KBP Forum last Thursday.
He added that the remaining 26 others are still the subject of clearing operations but expressed confidence that by December 31 this year, at least 80 to 90% of
barangays of Dagupan are already drug cleared.
Acting Dagupan police chief P/Supt. Miro (3rd from right) is joined by Sallisay barangay officials headed by Barangay Chairman Conrado Muyalde (2nd from left). (CIO photo)
Meanwhile, Miro announced that from July 1 this year, the police arrested 93 drug personalities, figured in six armed encounters that killed six drug suspects while 32 other drug personalities were killed by still unidentified perpetrators and whose deaths are still under investigation.
Under Oplan Tokhang, the city police have so far visited 10,000 households in the city.
SITIO ALING, LITTLE TONDO
He said Sitio Aling was once known the “little Tondo” in Dagupan, where drug personalities, snatchers, killers and other criminal elements held sway.
Apprised of the situation, he said he immediately formed composite teams of elements of the Dagupan City police and Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) for buy-bust operations in Sitio Aling the day after he assumed as acting chief of police on August 1. The operation led to the arrest of eight drug personalities.
They returned to the area a week later and busted a drug den being frequented by drug users. More drug personalities were arrested. He subsequently formed and left a task force in the area to see to it that no more drug transactions took place.
He said the top drug personality in Sitio Aling, Reynaldo Pulgal was also arrested but his drug trade was continued by his common-law-wife and son.
Shocked by the two successive slaying of two drug personalities in their village by unidentified suspects, residents of Aling boarded five jeepneys and trooped to the police station to pledge their full cooperation to stop the drug trade in their community.
To effectively control the situation, Miro required all sitio residents to be issued identification cards and those without IDs were barred from entering the sitio.
At Sitio Silungan, a community where migrant Moros had settled, Miro said he stationed one team from the Regional Public Safety Battalion to monitor and stop illegal drug activities in area.
However, drug trading still persisted in other parts of Bonuan Binloc. The chief of barangay tanod, identified as the alleged top distributor of illegal drugs in the village, was eventually gunned down and killed two weeks ago by unidentified suspected.
In Sitio Tondalingan where 200 Muslim families originally made it their home for years, only five families consisting of 38 individuals remain today.
He said a fire in the area in August forced some Muslim families to eventually leave and returned back to Mindanao. Mayor Belen Fernandez helped defray their transportation expenses. (Leonardo Micua)
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