DAVAO CITY -- The year 2005 was met with a bang, literally.

On the eve of the new year, a combined contingent of police, narcotics and intelligence agents raided a warehouse in Toril, south of downtown Davao City, and killed six people. Two cops were slightly wounded. A local paper described the raid as "bloody" while some critics called it an overkill.

Inside the warehouse were chemicals and equipment allegedly for processing shabu (methamphetamine hydrochloride) and a 152 million pesos worth of the illegal drug. Two .45 caliber and one 9mm pistols were also recovered from the scene.

"I told you not to f**k around in my city,” a fuming Mayor Rodrigo Duterte was quoted to have said, addressing the suspects, who were reportedly foreigners. “You are destroying my nation -- we will destroy you."

Less than a week later, two other warehouses alleged to have been storing shabu, this time in Obrero and in Bunawan districts, were also raided by Duterte’s men. These warehouses were believed to have been owned or operated by Shi Jin Sheng, a Chinese national who was also known as Allan Sy, or his wife Jed Pilapil-Sy, who had established a candy and chocolate business in the city three years ago.

Days after the raids, Jed Sy was arrested and detained at the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency. Later in the month, Allan Sy and several others were indicted for illegal drugs, which is punishable by death.

But Allan Sy, a suspected big-time druglord, was never found. He was not one of the six killed in the raid.

By the third week of January, Duterte declared everybody was "accounted for" and submitted his report to President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, who had earlier appointed Duterte as her “consultant for peace and public safety” in Mindanao. Earlier that week, Duterte said, according to media reports, that Allan Sy "will never be found.”

Meanwhile, the mayor ordered inspections of warehouses in the city while issuance of warehouse permits became tougher.

Following the series of drug busts, Duterte said he was "ready to face" the foreign drug syndicates operating in the city. He said he knew the risks. "This is an international drug syndicate and you know its implication," Duterte said. Known for his tough stance on crime, Duterte said those involved in illegal drugs "cannot get out of that business alive."

While police operations against big-time drug syndicates opened 2005, January ended with 42 people having fallen victim to the so-called Davao Death Squad. Authorities, while denying the existence of such a death squad, had not solved any of these crimes.

Meanwhile, other stories that hogged the front pages of local papers in January last year included the approval of a 990-million peso loan by the Land Bank for the city’s infrastructure projects, among others. There was also the raging debate in the city council on the issuance of an exploration permit to a mining firm that was being questioned by the council's environment committee. Seven top officials of the Davao City Water District also faced corruption allegations.

The case filed against two suspects of the twin bombings in the city in 2003 was also dismissed that month for insufficient evidence. Some of the suspects arrested and detained had complained of torture.

The Moro Islamic Liberation Front, on the other hand, cautioned former US ambassador to the Philippines Francis Ricciardone for issuing statements about the conflict in Mindanao. Ricciardone had reportedly questioned the sincerity of the MILF in the peace talks. Ricciardone issued the statement following the clashes in January in Maguindanao that left eight soldiers and 17 MILF fighters dead and 3,500 Moro families displaced.

Ricciardone's statements, according to MILF's central committee head

Advertisement

Muhammad Ameen, only "reinforces the perception that the US government has increasingly strengthened its direct intervention on Mindanao problem."

The other group waging an armed struggle against the government, the New People's Army, continued to be the military's top security headache in the region, said Army General Rodolfo Obaniana, who used to head the 404th Infantry Brigade based in Mawab, Compostela Valley. (Daisy C. Gonzales/davaotoday.com)