With orange spray paint, officials in a village of Lapu-Lapu City, Cebu marked a house with the words “identified drug den.”
This strategy is being implemented against homeowners who tolerate drugs to be sold or used on their property.
“We conducted this kind of campaign in our barangay because we noticed that monitoring of illegal drugs and drug den and police arrests are not enough to stop them from their bad ways. We hope that this shame campaign will have a domino effect to other areas,” village captain Junard Chan told local newspaper The Freeman.
The property is owned by a Rodolfo Larina, who had been arrested in the past for illegal drugs, but he denies selling drugs now.
He did admit, however, that the occupants in his property have used shabu (meth).
“We could not hold anyone else liable for this,” Chan said.
While other houses haven’t been marked yet, Chan encouraged other villages to follow the same strategy, saying that marking this house prompted users to surrender.
“This must be reviewed in light of the drastic fight of the government to end drug-related criminalities or arising out of the drug use in relation to the enshrined natural and fundamental human rights of all persons, including the suspects,” Arvin Odron, the regional chair of the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) told The Freeman.
He said that the campaign could present human rights issues because of the principle of the presumption of innocence.
He noted that the same strategy was done in Manila before President Rodrigo Duterte started his term but was stopped due to human rights issues.
“We need to talk likewise to the local officials concerned and the police to ensure that their actions, plans, programs are in accord with the human rights standards set by the international treaties which the Philippines ratified,” Odron said.
According to the CHR, at least 12,000 have been killed in the drug war so far, although this is a figure that the government disputes.
