Shabu. (INQUIRER FILE PHOTO/GRIG MONTEGRANDE)
This will give junkies a real high.
“Shabu” prices have shot up to their highest level since 2002 as a result of President Duterte’s bloody war on drugs, according to the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA).
Shabu is the local term for a highly addictive form of methamphetamine. It is also known as “ice” and “crystal meth.”
“From the price range of shabu of P1,200 to P11,000 per gram in June, shabu’s current price ranges from P1,200 to P25,000 per gram, which is the highest price since 2002,” PDEA Director General Isidro Lapeña told the Inquirer.
Lapeña said the average price range of P13,000 per gram was monitored from June 30, when Mr. Duterte assumed power, to Oct. 2.
He said the highest shabu price of P25,000 per gram was monitored in Soccsksargen (South Cotabato, Cotabato, Sultan Kudarat, Sarangani and General Santos City), while the lowest price of P1,000 per gram was monitored in the Zamboanga Peninsula.
In Metro Manila, the price of shabu ranges from P2,400 to P3,000 per gram, he said in an interview on the sidelines of the plenary budget deliberations at the House of Representatives.
Lapeña said the drastic rise in shabu prices showed the impact of Mr. Duterte’s war on drugs on supply.
3-month haul 572.64 kg
In the three months since the crackdown was launched, the authorities have seized 572.64 kilos of shabu, compared with 879.51 kilos in the first half of 2016, he added.
The government has also confiscated 521.59 kilos of marijuana leaves and 12,014 ecstasy tablets since June 30, dwarfing seizures in previous years, he said.
Secret laboratories
Five clandestine shabu laboratories and a chemical warehouse were also dismantled during that period, he added.
“I would say that the Duterte administration has accomplished so much in its first 100 days,” he said. “But there’s still much more to be accomplished.”
Lapeña pushed back against criticisms that a large majority of the people arrested or charged with drug trafficking were poor.
“Actually, the effort is there, even among big people, only that more people get arrested from the lower strata of society. It’s because they are the ones floating up,” he said.
“The big fish are people who do not carry illegal drugs. They transact their illegal business through the internet or telephone and they make their payment through bank transfers,” he said.
Killings
He dismissed mounting concerns about alleged extrajudicial killings involving thousands of drug suspects, claiming that these were not the work of government agencies.
“As the President said, his marching order is to stop and suppress illegal drugs by all means the law allows. That was his marching order. That’s in accordance with law,” he said.