EDITORIAL — Policing the coastline

Earlier this month, the Philippine Coast Guard recovered 20 sacks of rice containing suspect shabu valued at ?3 billion dumped off the coast of Pangasinan. This was not counting the eight sacks they earlier found that also held suspected shabu worth ?1.17 billion.

Yes, that’s billion with a B. The total amount of those sacks is even bigger than the budget allocation of some towns.

To be sure this is nothing new. Groups dumping contraband offshore then signaling their contacts to come get them as soon as the darkness or the tide comes in has been done since the earliest days of smuggling. Some drug syndicates have even tried this method to get bricks of cocaine into the country.

What is new is that these offshore drops are now becoming bigger and bigger in terms of monetary value. It’s as if there is now desperation on the part of the drug syndicates to get their product into the country and in the streets.

This can mean the drug syndicates may no longer feel safe establishing labs to cook shabu here, or that those policing our airports and seaports for prohibited items have become so good in their jobs they dare not use them anymore. If so, then this is good news.

But then again this may be bad news, because if drug syndicates have decided this is now how they want to get drugs into the country, our authorities might have a hard time catching them.

Because unlike those sacks the shabu was put in, our borders are porous. In fact we really don’t have borders to speak of, but a very extensive coastline that cannot be policed all at once.

The PCG should be lauded for finding what they did. Billions in drugs hitting the streets means more lives ruined and more money lining the pockets of drug lords. But are we sure all sacks of shabu dumped offshore didn’t make it to the streets?

Policing the entirety of our coastline comes with many challenges. Those who do so need all our support.