DILG exec: Supreme Court, not group of lawyers, should say if drug war files are ‘rubbish’

MANILA, Philippines — The Center for International Law is not in the position to describe as “rubbish” the voluminous drug war documents submitted to the Supreme Court, an Interior and Local Government official said as he branded as “propaganda” the accusation of the organization.

DILG Usec. Jonathan Malaya said the Supreme Court is the best body to determine whether the documents submitted by the Office of the Solicitor General and the Philippine National Police are not drug-related.

“Whether those documents are indeed unrelated to the drug war and if indeed those documents are rubbish, it is not for an organization such as CenterLaw to come up with a statement,” Malaya said in an interview over ABS-CBN News Channel Tuesday.

Malaya claimed the move of CenterLaw, one of the petitioners who questioned the government’s war on drugs before the high court, is part of the propaganda of those opposing the anti-narcotics campaign.

“Obviously, CenterLaw is a critic of the government. Definitely, they have agenda against the government; therefore, they would find a way to put the government in a bad light,” the DILG official said.

‘Rubbish, unrelated drug files’

CenterLaw asked the Supreme Court to cite the government’s chief law and police officers for submitting “rubbish” and non-drug related files.

“What the Office of the Solicitor General and the Philippine National Police virtually want is for the Supreme Court and the petitioners to utterly waste valuable time and resources examining case files which are totally irrelevant,” the group of lawyers said in its motion.

CenterLaw said that 90% of the solved cases submitted by the OSG and the PNP were not drug related, while 56% of the unsolved cases were also not related to drugs.

The group said the government “cannot feign ignorance” in their obligation and should be ordered to submit the complete and correct documents.

“I don’t think the OSG and the PNP would do that because the Supreme Court is the highest court of the land, they would not submit documents which are rubbish,” Malaya said.

The International Criminal Court is also looking into several communications alleging crimes against humanity committed by the Duterte administration over the thousands of deaths under its brutal crackdown on drugs. — Gaea Katreena Cabico