MAGUINDANAO, Philippines — Authorities arrested early Wednesday in Pandag town five suspected large-scale drug traffickers linked to outlawed militant groups claiming allegiance to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
Dante Karatuan, 34; Roy Datukali, 22; Jomar Jainal, 20; Gale Mangandaong, 20; and Jerry Talib, 39, are now detained at the Pandag municipal police station and will be prosecuted for violation of the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act.
They were nabbed together in a joint operation by the Army’s 33rd Infantry Battalion and the police in Barangay Kayaga in Pandag town in the second district of Maguindanao province.
Senior Superintendent Agustin Tello, Maguindanao police director, said on Wednesday that personnel of the Pandag municipal police and the 33rd IB launched the operation based on tips from the suspects' neighbors, among them barangay officials and Muslim community elders.
More than a dozen large-scale drug traffickers in different barangays in Pandag have been neutralized in the past year in joint operations by the police, the 33rd IB and the local government.
Barangay residents are convinced the five men arrested on Wednesday in Barangay Kayaga shared a part of their earnings from drug-peddling activities with ISIS-inspired Jihadist groups.
The team that cornered them in their hideout and recovered from their possession methamphetamine hydrochloride (shabu), assorted firearms, a fragmentation grenade, a laptop computer, gun parts, cameras and P16,000 in cash.
Tello said the suspects will be charged with illegal possession of firearms too.
“We ought to thank the LGU of Pandag and the 33rd IB for this feat,” Tello said.
Pandag Mayor Zihan Mamalinta-Mangudadatu, chairperson of the municipal peace and order council, said the local police and all barangay tanods in the municipality are on alert against possible retaliations by accomplices of the five suspects.