THE quad committee of the House of Representatives is planning to present to the plenary before the Christmas break next week an initial report on its investigation into the proliferation of illegal drugs and its connection to Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators (POGOs) and extrajudicial killings (EJKs) under the administration of former President Rodrigo Duterte.
Surigao del Norte Rep. Robert Ace Barbers said the four committees intend to submit the report by December 18, or before Congress goes on recess on December 21.
Barbers said the joint panel needs to present a “progress report” to allow the House to start processing the several remedial legislative measures filed by the committee’s leaders and members.
“The reason why we will submit this to the plenary is because of the progress report, because there are things that need to be acted upon immediately,” he said.
He said the plenary may even ask President Marcos Jr. to include the measures in his priority legislative agenda, or to certify them as urgent so that Congress could expedite their approval.
“Dapat siguro, kung pu-pwede, maisama sa legislative agenda ng ating Pangulo, or baka suwertehin pa tayo, ma-certify as urgent ‘yung bill nang sa ganun ‘yung counterpart namin sa Senate ay gumawa din at kumilos din (Maybe it can be included in the President’s legislative agenda or, if we get lucky, it could be certified as urgent bills so our Senate counterparts can start crafting their own versions),” Barbers said.
“So, what we are hoping for is, once the plenary has majority of the members agree and vote in support of this report, then perhaps it will give a signal that this should be included in the legislative agenda of our President,” he also said.
Barbers said there are about four bills filed seeking amendments to Republic Act No. 9165, or the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002, following the revelations in the hearings on how the Duterte administration’s war on drugs was implemented.
Among the remedial pieces of legislation that quad committee chairmen and members have filed are the bills seeking to define extrajudicial killing as a heinous crime and imposing the maximum penalty on offenders, and another one seeking the creation of an inter-agency government committee led by the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) that would expedite the administrative cancellation of questionable birth certificates.
The latter measure was filed after lawmakers discovered during the lengthy hearings that several Chinese nationals have acquired Filipino citizenships using fake birth certificates which they used to illegally establish businesses in the country and acquire properties.
The Chinese citizens even formed corporations and purchased land and buildings which they used for illegal activities, including a warehouse in Barangay San Jose Malino in Mexico town, Pampanga, where authorities seized a shabu shipment worth P3.6-billion in September 2023.
Barbers said the initial progress report is also expected to also include recommendations for the filing of charges against individuals linked to illegal drugs, illicit POGOs and EJKs, especially since lawmakers found out that POGO money was used to reward cops who killed drug suspects.
“Maybe its high time that we report this out and let the appropriate agency conduct further investigation on EJK and there also some about POGO and illegal drugs,” he said.
Barbers said the mega panel will soon terminate the investigation on POGOs so it could focus on drugs and EJKs.
The quad committee leader said there is no more need to again invite the former president to attend the hearings since he has already exhaustively answered the committee when he attended one of the hearings.
“No need na siguro because yong 12-13 hours na meeting natin sa kanya basically ‘yun na ‘yung gusto nating marinig (Maybe there’s no more need [to invite Duterte] because our last 12-13 hours meeting with him, we’ve already heard what we wanted to hear), a little more than what he revealed or what he admitted in the Senate. So, sa tingin ko sufficient na ‘yon (So I think that’s already sufficient),” Barbers said.
The 79-year-old former chief executive is being investigated by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for “crimes against humanity,” even if the Marcos Jr. administration has maintained that it will not cooperate in the probe.
The Duterte administration withdrew from the ICC’s Rome Statute on March 17, 2018 amid the international court’s probe into his administration’s bloody drug war.
