Illegal drugs issue in Taguig City draws blood from Cayetano, Tiñga camps

The Philippine National Police (PNP) on Thursday said they were confident that the special investigating team looking into the alleged involvement of police officials in the proliferation of illegal drugs in Taguig City would be able to find out the truth.

“The PNP hierarchy is very much interested in knowing if there is truth to the accusations of PO3 Alexander Saez against Taguig police chief Senior Supt. Tomas Apolinario Jr.,” PNP spokesperson Chief Supt. Generoso Cerbo Jr. told reporters in Camp Crame.

At a news forum on Monday, Saez said Apolinario and nine other members of the Taguig police station’s anti-illegal drugs special operations task group were behind the reselling of confiscated illegal drugs.

The group was also accused of hiding records of capital crimes in the city in a second police blotter to paint a rosy picture of the city’s peace and order situation.

Apolinario has denied the allegations, saying members of local drug syndicates operating in the city were behind the smear campaign against him and his men.

Cerbo said the PNP will support whatever is the decision of Director Leonardo Espina, the National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) chief, and the recommendation of the special investigating team on the case.

“We assure the public that whoever may be found guilty will be dismissed and charged criminally and administratively,” he added.

Taguig Mayor Lani Cayetano has backed the investigation, using the issue to take a swipe at her political rivals.

“If it is proven that the allegations are true, then let’s punish the guilty. But if the allegations are proven wrong, we should be quick as well to exonerate the innocent,” she said.

In the same statement, however, Cayetano also asked the NCRPO to look into the “personalities behind the illegal drug trade in Taguig.”

The statement apparently referred to seven members of a drug syndicate arrested earlier who are allegedly relatives of former Taguig City Mayor Freddie Tiñga.

Cayetano asked the NCRPO to “uncover why the case against the members of the drug syndicate were all dropped or dismissed.”

She added that under her administration since 2010, she had stepped up the campaign against illegal drugs, which led to the arrest of Elisa Tiñga, reportedly the third-most wanted drug dealer in Taguig.

Apolinario, however, said he had earned the ire of the Tiñga drug syndicate since Elisa Tinga’s arrest.

Taguig Rep. Freddie Tiñga, on the other hand, dismissed Cayetano’s and Apolinario’s statements as “political mudslinging.”

“These allegations of a Tiñga syndicate crop up whenever elections are fast approaching as part of a black propaganda campaign against us,” Tiñga said, adding that it is actually Cayetano who has a lot to answer for.

“The drug situation in Taguig has gotten worse, and you only have the Cayetano administration to blame. If the allegations against the police chief are true, then the mayor should also be held responsible,” he said.

“She has to face the people and explain why Taguig has deteriorated in such a short span of time under her administration,” he added.