PDEA claims seizing P874 M worth of drugs in Parañaque raid

Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA)

MANILA, Philippines—The bulk of illegal drugs seized from a clandestine laboratory in Parañaque City early this month has been valued at a staggering P874 million, the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency said Friday.

In a statement, PDEA officer-in-charge Carlos F. Gadapan said among the illegal drugs recovered in the laboratory were 372 kilograms of ephedrine; 100 liters of liquid methamphetamine hydrochloride (“shabu”); 8,419 kilograms of solid and 39,884 liters of liquid chemicals.

Also seized were various kinds of laboratory equipment and other materials used in the manufacture of shabu from the “mega clandestine laboratory” found at Km 19, East Service Road in San Martin De Porres on June 6.

“The property [in Parañaque] is about three times larger than the one-hectare clandestine laboratory in Ayala Alabang,” he said.

“The basement was used as laboratory for manufacturing shabu. The ground floor was utilized as storage for chemicals, while the second floor served as the cooling or drying area. Our chemists had to work for eight straight days to finish processing the facility and conducting chemical analysis,” Gadapan said.

He said the complete processing of the clandestine laboratory alone, which involved identifying and marking evidence, taking samples, conducting field tests, and taking full inventory,  took four days, as the chemists had to work from one level of the property to another.

He said another five days were spent analyzing the chemical composition of 8,791 kilograms and 39,984 liters of chemicals.

Gadapan said that there was a possibility that the laboratory in Parañaque was connected to at least two of three laboratories dismantled earlier this year in the exclusive Ayala Alabang Village in Muntinlupa.

“All of these facilities employ the Nagai process using red phosphorous to manufacture shabu. We also found [in the Parañaque clandestine laboratory] the same empty blister packs of Novahist discovered in Kanlaon and Country Club Drive in Ayala, Alabang, Muntinlupa,” Gadapan said.

Based on laboratory examination, Novahist contains pseudo-ephedrine, classified as a dangerous drug under Republic Act 9165, or the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002. Novahist, manufactured in Pakistan, is not available in the Philippine market.

“We presume that these [Novahist] tablets are being smuggled into the country. It is not registered with the Bureau of Food and Drug. We also have no record that PDEA issued import permit for the legitimate importation of Novahist,” Gadapan said.