Vice President Leni Robredo. PNA File Photo.
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By JIGGER J. JERUSALEM
Correspondent .

WHOEVER is appointed by President Duterte as co-chairperson of the Inter-Agency Committee on Illegal Drugs (Icad), the police in the region would continue to do its job of going after those involved in the illegal drug trade in this part of the country, Camp Alagar said yesterday.

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Hortillosa

“[We] will respect whatever the decision in the higher-level authorities and just follow whatever the directives pertain to our mandates in maintaining the peace and order of the region,” said Lt. Col. Mardy Hortilosa, the police regional spokesperson.

He added: “The regional office will continue to work every day to protect the people and will leave to the policymakers the making of policy and strategy pertaining to anti-illegal drugs operation since our job is to implement whatever mandated to us through laws, policy, and guidelines.”

Hortillosa’s reaction came following Duterte’s decision to fire Vice President Maria Leonor Robredo as an Icad co-chair on Sunday.

“Our office can’t give any statement with regards to the effectiveness of VP Robredo since we don’t know what are the things that happened up there,” Hortillosa said.

On Sunday, presidential spokesperson Salvador Panelo said the designation of Robredo was an offer to make the campaign against illegal drugs better, “ a chance where both this Administration and the political opposition could have unified in fighting the social ill that has destroyed the lives of many and imperiled thousands of others” but Robredo, he said, “wasted such opportunity and used the same as a platform to attack the methods undertaken by this Administration.”

Panelo said the President’s firing of Robredo was also “in response to the suggestion of Liberal Party President, Senator Francis Pangilinan, to just fire the Vice President from her post” and in response as well to the “taunt and dare of VP Robredo for the President to just tell her that he wants her out.”

“It is time to put the issue to eternal rest and bury it in the graveyard of what could have been, as well as dismiss any obstacle that impedes the government to focus on the issue at hand,” he said. 

The announcement of Robredo’s firing came a day after Duterte said sorry for believing the “fake news” that she invited investigators from the United Nations (UN) to come to the country to probe the anti-drug campaign of his administration.

“I am sorry because I said you only realize that it is false news when the news comes out. And you hear it and you talk about it, you react to it, that is the problem,” Duterte told reporters on Saturday.

Duterte initially dared Robredo to be the “drug czar,” which he said would be a Cabinet position. Robredo accepted the challenge. She was not named Cabinet member but as Icad co-chair.

Duterte later said he could not trust Robredo because she belongs to the opposition Liberal Party. ”Hindi kami magka-partido,” he said. (with reports from Antonio L. Colina IV, Mindanews)

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