PDEA to politicians: Leave us out

Spare us from dirty politics, please.

The Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) on Sunday asked politicians not to use the name of the antinarcotics agency to advance their political interests by spreading false drug information and “intelligence reports” against their rivals.

In a statement, PDEA Director General Jose Gutierrez Jr. said the agency and its agents would “remain apolitical” following reports that some politicians would try to use it in the runup to the 2013 midterm elections.

“PDEA will not allow itself to be used for politicking,” he said, adding that the agency “will continue its fight against illegal drugs without fear or favor.”

“As far as PDEA is concerned… we will just do our job. We validate the information we receive as part of the regular process. We don’t (just) jump to conclusions,” Gutierrez said.

He vehemently denied reports that some senior PDEA officials had received P1 million and luxury vehicles purportedly to fabricate intelligence information linking Taguig City Representative Freddie Tinga and his family to the illegal drug trade.

“We will not allow ourselves to be used. Our work is to validate all information coming to us and build up the cases against (personalities involved in illegal drugs),” he said.

Tinga, a former mayor of Taguig, had sought PDEA’s help to look into what he claimed were attempts by some individuals to again connect him to illegal drug syndicates.

Gutierrez, however, described the insinuations as “pure speculation and completely without basis.”

“We are not involved in any kind of agreement with political personalities just to pin down their rivals. There’s no such thing,” he said.

In 2010, Tinga and his father, former Supreme Court Associate Justice Dante Tinga, were accused by PDEA intelligence agent Jeffrey Roquero of influencing a Pasig City Regional Trial Court judge, who threw out the drug case filed against two of the Tingas’ relatives allegedly caught selling illegal drugs.

The Tingas brushed off the allegation and filed a libel case against Roquero. Marlon Ramos

Originally posted: 8:45 pm | Sunday, September 2nd, 2012