PDEA men, cops suspended over ‘tanim droga’

CAMP OLIVAS, PAMPANGA—Eight Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) agents and four policemen on Thursday were suspended pending investigation of claims that they planted drugs to link a government employee to drug trafficking.

But PDEA officials denied the allegations of Wilhelmo Galura that he was a victim of “tanim-droga,” allegedly done by law enforcers during a drug bust on April 26 in Bacolor town.

At a news conference, Juvenal Azurin, PDEA Central Luzon chief, and Chief Supt. Aaron Aquino, Central Luzon police director, said Galura, an employee of the Pampanga engineering office, had lied.

They said Galura had been under surveillance for three months.

PDEA played a video footage showing several men, including Galura, exchanging cash and “shabu” (methamphetamine hydrochloride).

The suspension of the policemen and PDEA agents involved in the drug bust was “administrative in nature” so they could not influence the investigation, Aquino said.

He said Galura was the principal target of the operation. His accomplice, identified as Carlos Santos, remained at large. —TONETTE OREJAS