SWS: Majority of Filipinos fear EJKs

MANILA, Philippines — The latest Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey on the Duterte administration's war on drugs and extrajudicial killings revealed that majority of Filipinos are worried that they or anyone they know would fall victim to such killings.

Based on the SWS survey published by the BusinessWorld on Monday, 45 percent were “very worried” that they would become a victim of killings, 33 percent were “somewhat worried,” while 10 and 12 percent were “not too worried” and “not worried at all,” respectively. The survey showed that 78 percent of adult Filipinos fear that they would become victims of killings.

Aside from worries on the killings, the SWS survey also showed that 39 percent of the respondents consider the issue of extrajudicial killings as “very serious.” On the other hand, 30 percent said it is “somewhat serious” while 22 percent were “undecided.” Only 3 percent said the killings were “not serious at all.”

For 71 percent the respondents, it is “very important” that drug suspects are caught alive, similar to the result of the third quarter SWS survey. Meanwhile, 23 percent said it is “somewhat important,” 4 percent said it is “somewhat not important” and only 1 percent answered that it is “not at all important” to catch drug suspects alive.

The same survey showed that 70 percent of respondents find that the Duterte administration is serious about solving cases of extrajudicial killings in the country. Some 38 percent of them said the government is “very serious” and 32 percent said it is “somewhat serious.” On the other hand, 20 percent were “undecided” and only six percent said the administration was “somewhat not serious.”

The respondents, however, were divided when asked about their opinion on whether the police are telling the truth that the suspects they killed really resisted arrest.

About 9 percent believe the police were “definitely telling the truth” and 19 percent said they are “probably telling the truth.” On the other hand, 16 percent said cops were “definitely not telling the truth” while 13 percent said they are “probably not telling the truth.” Some 42 percent of respondents were undecided whether the cops are telling the truth.

Records from the Philippine National Police (PNP) said that cops have killed 2,102 and arrested 40,932 suspects through legitimate operations between July 1 and December 14. Its data also said that there are 2,886 deaths under investigations from July 1 to December 12 with a disclaimer that some of the murders are still being probed and are not automatically connected with the anti-illegal drugs campaign.

Some 908,244 drug users and pushers surrendered before authorities under President Rodrigo Duterte’s administration.

Despite their fear of the killings and doubt on the PNP’s arrest system, 85 percent of the respondents were satisfied with the campaign with 53 and 32 percent saying they were “very satisfied” and “somewhat satisfied,” respectively. Meanwhile, 5 percent were “somewhat dissatisfied,” 3 percent “very dissatisfied” and 7 percent were undecided.

The survey showed that the Duterte administration’s performance in its war on drugs is “excellent” this quarter.

The fourth quarter survey was conducted from December 3 to 6 via face-to-face interviews with 1,500 adult respondents nationwide. It has a sampling error margin of ±3 points.