Thousands of orphans bear drug war trauma

GRANDMOTHER AND MOTHER It is not cheaper by the dozen for Sarah Celiz, a 58-year-old grandmother who was forced to take care of 12 of the young children (10 shown in this picture) of her two sons who were killed by police at the height of the drug war in 2017. She earns a meager income as a laundry woman in Caloocan City. —PHOTO Courtesy of Sarah Celiz

Seven years ago, a boy and his younger brother were well-behaved and never missed their classes, and then on a whim, they dropped out of school in January this year.

Their grandmother said Antony, 14, and Erwin, 13, both sixth graders, began scavenging the streets of Tondo, Manila, sniffing solvent for a “cheap high” and sleeping under a bridge. Many times, the brothers, whose true names are not being disclosed in this report for their security, had been beaten up and shot at by policemen for allegedly stealing food.

“They used to be good, shy kids,” their 58-year-old grandmother told the Inquirer. But she knew when Erwin and Antony started to change and why.

In September 2016, the boys’ father was killed inside their home in Caloocan City, becoming one of the thousands of drug suspects killed in the Duterte administration’s war on drugs.

During an interview, the depth of the boys’ trauma became evident when they were asked what they wanted to be when they grow up. Antony said, “vlogger,” while Erwin replied, “policeman,” so he could help fight criminals.

But something dark lurked behind Erwin’s seemingly innocent answer.

“He told me he just wanted to own a gun so he could kill policemen,” Antony said, adding: “Just because they have a gun, they think they can do anything they want. It’s like all police are evil.”

Antony said the police shot their father allegedly because he had a gun. He insisted that it wasn’t true.

Priest and pastoral counselor Teodulo Gonzalez said the brothers were exhibiting signs of “repetition complex,” or the unconscious drive to repeat traumatic events by “embracing the power of the aggressor.”

Gonzalez said he’d seen the same case in many other drug war orphans. “It’s an irrational motivation that could also mean the desire to protect themselves from the fate of their parents,” he said.

Estimates for now

Antony and Erwin are just two of the thousands of children orphaned by former President Rodrigo Duterte’s campaign against illegal drugs and are now struggling with inner demons because of it.

Carlos Conde, senior researcher for Human Rights Watch (HRW), estimates that the drug war left at least 20,000 orphans. He based this on the official drug war death toll of 6,252 and the average of three children per Filipino family.

“If we assume that the majority of those killed were family men, then it’s not far-fetched to say there are 20,000 orphans left behind. That’s even a conservative estimate,” he told the Inquirer.

Conde’s figure is close to the 18,000 drug war orphans estimated by former Assistant Secretary Hope Hervilla of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD). No empirical study has been made on the actual number of drug war orphans.

The Inquirer requested disaggregated data such as age and social and marital status of those killed in the antidrug campaign from Philippine National Police in an email early in June. There has been no response.

Aid, counseling

Representatives of the Redemptorist Church and five nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) which have been assisting families of the drug war victims—Program Paghilom of the Arnold Jensen Kalinga Foundation, Children’s Legal Rights and Development Center, Resbak, Rise Up and In Defense of Human Rights and Dignity Movement (iDEFEND)—agreed that the HRW’s estimates were “highly possible.”

These groups have provided livelihood assistance and counseling services to more than 1,000 families in Metro Manila and nearby provinces.

Paghilom head Fr. Flavie Villanueva said Conde’s numbers were still “very conservative” in comparison to the Commission on Human Rights (CHR’s) estimate of 30,000 victims, including “deaths under investigation,” or those killed by unidentified assailants.

“Even if we get just a third of that, doing the easy math, you would get more than 20,000 orphans,” Villanueva said.

Multiplied misery

The aid groups found that the drug war victims were mostly men who were household heads, in their 20s to 50s, and each with at least three children.

“If you kill the breadwinner, it’s like you killed the whole family, too,” Rise Up coordinator, Rubylin Litao said. “So if you want to get a complete picture of how massive the impact of the drug war was, you multiply each death with three or four for the orphans.”

The DSWD has not responded to emailed inquiries on its assistance to families of suspects killed in the drug war. In 2016, the DSWD said it would provide assistance to the families through its Sustainable Livelihood Program and Crisis Intervention Unit.

The NGOs said a few families received P10,000 in funeral assistance from the DSWD. They said the overwhelming majority received nothing from the government.

The two brothers’ grandmother and the mother of two other drug war victims told the Inquirer they received no government aid.

Moving on is not a realistic option for the orphans as they continue to suffer from the reverberating effects of the drug war.

Twice abandoned

Many of them experienced “double abandonment,” with their mothers leaving home shortly after their fathers were killed. These children were left to the care of their nearly incapacitated grandparents, as was the case of Sarah Celiz, 58.

Her sons, Almon, 33, and Dicklie, 31, were both tagged as drug suspects. Police killed Almon in February 2017 and Dicklie died six months later in another antidrug operation. The police said they fought back with guns, but Celiz said her sons couldn’t even afford to buy guns.

The brothers each had six children, all minors, and for the past six years Celiz has been taking care of them. Her new family of 14, counting her husband, is squeezed into a 10-square-meter makeshift house in Caloocan.

Depending on a meager laundry woman’s earnings and assistance from NGOs, Celiz admits that she can’t send some of her grandchildren to school and putting food on the table is a daily struggle.

“I love them and I’ll do everything for them, but I feel like I’m breaking, like my body’s going to give up,” Celiz said, wiping off tears.

One of her granddaughters offered to quit school to find work and help take care of her siblings, but she refused.

“I want her to have a better chance in life. I can still keep going,” Celiz said.

How healing can start

Both Antony and Erwin have gone back to live with their grandmother. They want to go back to school “but our life is just tough now to make that happen.” They are making a little money assisting drivers park their cars.

Healing for these families starts with economic, educational and psychomedical support that would “ultimately trickle down to the orphans who are the real victims now,” Villanueva said.

The aid groups expressed hope that the Marcos administration’s antidrug campaign would be humane and focused on rehabilitation instead of punitive actions. “It would mean a better chance for the children,” Gonzalez said.

But healing also comes with justice.

Celiz was chosen by her fellow complainants to testify in the cases they had filed against Duterte in the International Criminal Court for alleged crimes against humanity committed in his war on drugs.

“I will continue this fight,” she vowed. “When I die, my grandchildren will continue it for us.”

(This story was produced with support from the Drug Policy Reform Initiative (DPRI) media fellowship.)

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