Shabu worth P3.4M seized from Cotabato City suspect

INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

COTABATO CITY — Anti-drug enforcers arrested a drug peddler from Sultan Kudarat province, who was in possession of half a kilo of shabu (crystal meth), during a drug buy-bust operation Monday along Sinsuat Avenue in this city.

Jocelyn Mary, speaking for the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM), said Norhan Padao, a driver residing in Barangay Kalawag 2, Isulan, Sultan Kudarat, was found to have 10 huge sachets of suspected shabu (crystal meth) placed inside a baby’s diaper and a P600,000 boodle money.

Earlier, agents of PDEA-BARMM’s regional intelligence operations team conducted a buy-bust operation at 7 a.m. in front of a “barbecue stand” at Sinsuat Avenue in Barangay Poblacion 5 here.

Mary said the 10 sachets of shabu weighed 500 grams, and was seized in what was the 9th big-time anti-drug operation conducted by PDEA across BARMM since January.

READ: 2 Cotabato drug suspects arrested, P3.4-M ‘shabu’ seized

“We have placed the suspect under surveillance for about a month,” Mary said. “We are trying to determine who are his principals and where he gets his supplies,” Mary added.

To date, more than P22 million worth of shabu had been confiscated from drug peddlers, mostly in Cotabato City, Maguindanao del Sur, Maguindanao, Lanao del Sur, Sulu, and Tawi-Tawi, according to PDEA-BARMM regional chief Gil Cesario Castro.

Padao is now detained at PDEA detention facility while charges of violating the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002 are being prepared against him.

READ: 3 drug suspects nabbed with P1.3-M meth in Cotabato City