SAGADA, Mountain Province – The reported marijuana plants confiscated allegedly at the backyard of George Hotel here has affected inflow of guests of the inn likewise bringing this popular tourist destination in bad light.
Theodora Tauli, proprietress of George Hotel said as a result of news reports in almost all the regional papers that some potted marijuana plants were confiscated in the backyard of their hotel by trainees of the Philippine National Police during their recent educational trip to this tourist town, their business suffered.
“Since the local newspapers came out with the newspaper accounts that marijuana plants were uprooted in the backyard of our hotel, guests as well as other customers had been flooding my mobile phone asking whether the news reports are true or false,” Tauli said , adding guests as well as the Sagada community are wary if their hotel employers are offering marijuana for a fee or for free.
In a follow-up inquiry of this paper, the potted marijuana plants were spotted by a police officer during their group’s educational tour in Sagada.
Reports have it that while they were taking coffee early morning of June 22, the said police officer noticed some potted marijuana plants at a front yard of a house near the vicinity of George Inn where they were billeted.
The owner of the house, who requested anonymity, said that the potted marijuana plants were practically used for medicinal purposes as a physician once told him that drinking marijuana tea in small dosage is good whenever his asthma attacks. “There were even times when school heads borrowed the potted marijuana plants as materials of their information and educational campaigns against illegal drugs for parents and students in order them to see the real plant instead of relying on posters and pictures.”
Nine potted fully-grown marijuana plants were earlier taken in the front yard of a house near George Inn at Barangay Dagdag, this town two weeks ago by police trainees.
Marijuana seedlings were also found another pot.
This claim was validated by a cancer patient here who said when pain relievers hardly eased the pain that he felt, he would ask somebody to go and get some marijuana leaves for him to use as tea, and which would relieve the extreme pain.
“In order that Sagada would not be put in bad light, reporters of different media outlets should first verify facts before their reports would see print in the regional papers as well as in the broadcast media,” Tauli said.
She added as far as she knows, no hotel or inn keepers in the town offer marijuana or illegal drugs to their guests.
“We (referring to restaurant and hotel owners) do abide with the law, especially caring for the reputation that the community in the eyes of the tourism industry not to mention the regular monitoring of officers from the Sagada police,” Tauli said referring to visibility of the police in their institutions.
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