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by Rodel Rodis
January 7, 2011
Men with receding hairlines may take comfort in the modern proverb “the more you lose hair, the more you gain face.” I do not know if Pres. Noynoy Aquino is losing more hair but I do fear he is losing more face as a result of his decision to boycott the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony honoring Liu Xiaobo.
Pres. Aquino’s Communications Secretary Ricky Carangdang explained that the President simply heeded the advice of his Secretary of Foreign Affairs Alberto Romulo to join the 19 nations boycotting the Oslo event in solidarity with China out of concern for five Filipino “drug mules” who are on China’s Death Row.
The problem is that once Pres. Aquino accepted and adopted Romulo’s recommendation, it became his drug mule problem.
Inquirer columnist and former RP Ambassador to Greece Rigoberto Tiglao expressed doubts that this humanitarian gesture will even work. “If China does not execute the Filipino convicts, and because Aquino said it was some sort of a deal,” he wrote, “it would universally be condemned as a hostage-taker. More so if it executed other drug traffickers from countries which attended the Nobel ceremony.”
“Public appeals for clemency by foreign states have even hastened the execution of drug traffickers. This was the case when China wasted no time executing a British national after the British foreign minister publicly appealed for clemency. This was also the case of five Japanese drug carriers executed early this year. The Chinese judiciary is said to be very keen on proving itself independent from the executive branch,” Tiglao noted.
Unfortunately for Pres. Aquino, the number of Filipino drug mules incarcerated in China’s Death Row is not 5 but 75. This was disclosed by Dionisio Santiago, chief of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA), in a Philippine Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing last September.
According to Santiago, there are currently 205 Filipinos in China who have been charged as drug mules: 5 of the detained have been meted the death penalty and are out of options, 70 more have been sentenced to death but their cases are still on appeal, 35 have been sentenced to life imprisonment, 68 have fixed-term sentences while 27 have cases pending in court.
Make that at least 28. On November 5, 2010, the Philippine Embassy in China reported the arrest of a young Pinay school teacher in Guandong Province for carrying heroin. Although she was issued an alien employment permit by the Chinese government to teach, she returned from a vacation in the Philippines with 1,996 grams of heroin which were discovered inside a foil packet in her checked-in suitcase when she was inspected at Guangzhou Airport.
Although most of the past drug couriers generally came from impoverished backgrounds, this school teacher reflects the current preference of international drug rings for young professionals or office workers with presentable personalities as drug mules. They are lured by promises of free travel, free I-Pads and hefty allowances.
The PDEA reported that the smuggled drug packages come in different forms. Some drug mules are either asked to swallow the drugs sealed in plastic, hide it in their underwear, or have them surgically inserted into their genital areas.
This reportedly is why most of the drug mules are Pinays, 62%, compared to 38% Pinoys.
The proliferation of Filipino drug mules is not limited to China as there are currently 630 Filipinos in prison in different parts of the world for acting as drug couriers of high-profile international syndicates, according to the PDEA.
Recently, nine West African nationals were arrested for attempting to recruit drug mules in Southeast Asia to work for a major drug syndicate from Latin America.
The US State Department expressed alarm at these recent developments. According to its 2010 International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (INCSR), “sophisticated transnational drug-trafficking syndicates including a West African group using overseas Filipino workers as couriers” have increased their presence in the Philippines. “From only three in 2008, the number of foreign-based drug organizations operating in the Philippines has increased to nine,” the Report noted.
The INCSR further warned that the illegal drug trade in the Philippines has evolved into a billion-dollar industry, valued at over $8.4 billion (about P368.2 billion) a year.
According to the INCSR, the illegal drug industry in the Philippines “is fueled by foreign-organized criminal activities from China, Hong Kong and Taiwan; insurgency groups that partially fund their activities through local crime and the trafficking of narcotics and arms, engaging in money laundering through ties to organized crime; and the proceeds of official or bureaucratic corruption which are also a source of laundered funds.”
At a Christmas party in Beijing, Philippine Ambassador to China Sonia Cataumber Brady told members of the Filipino community that Chinese syndicates regularly use mostly Pinays to smuggle illegal drugs into China. “Despite repeated warnings by the Philippine government, our kababayans continue to be victimized by these drug syndicates with wide network operations in various parts of Asia,” she said.
The problem is more complex than just 5 Filipino drug mules on China’s Death Row. While the Philippine government cannot allow itself to be constantly subjected to China’s blackmail threats, the government should do more to inspect possible drug mules before they leave the Philippines and to educate Filipinos about the sometimes fatal consequences of being caught in China or anywhere else with drugs in their possession.
The political problem for Pres. Aquino is that China may believe that if he is willing to boycott Oslo to save 5 Filipino drug mules on Death Row, how many other Filipino drug mules on Death Row will it take for the Philippines to give up its claim to the Spratley Islands? This drug mule problem is enough to cause Pres. Aquino to lose more hair and more face.
(Send comments to Rodel50@aol.com or mail them to the Law Offices of Rodel Rodis at 2429 Ocean Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94127 or call 415.334.7800).