‘Gov’t Cordi eradication drives making marijuana proliferate’

DRUG OPERATIVES uproot marijuana at the border of Sadanga, Mountain Province and Tinglayan, Kalinga.

BAGUIO CITY – Folks in remote towns in the Cordillera where marijuana thrives say it is actually eradication drives that are making the illegal plants proliferate.

When marijuana plants are uprooted and carried away, seeds fall off and sprout and within a few months, mountains are lush green and the plants are ready for harvest, locals say.

But according to the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency in Cordillera, marijuana is purposely grown in the region even if residents and officials in remote areas like Tinglayan, Kalinga maintain it is actually eradication operations by government that is contributing to proliferation of the banned plant.    

“Marijuana is done like high-value agriculture, PDEA Cordillera director Gil Castro said after authorities discovered another marijuana plantation along the boundary of Mountain Province and Kalinga August 6.

Anti-drug operatives recently overran four plantation sites covering a total of 6,150 square meters, said Brig. Gen. R’Win Pagkalinawan, Cordillera police director.

Castro said while eradication operations are intensifying, the PDEA and the Philippine National Police are conducting an investigation "to find out who should be held criminally or administratively liable for intentional cultivation."

Sadanga Mayor Gabino Ganggangan has also confirmed marijuana plantations along his town's borders with Tinglayan, saying people from Buscalan and Bugnay barangays have been encroaching into the town's land to plant marijuana.

In 2018, then Kalinga Gov. Jocel Baac confirmed the proliferation of illegal marijuana plantations particularly in Tinglayan but cited socio-economic reasons behind such.

The illegal agricultural activity has long been there, Baac said then, even when Fidel Ramos — later defence minister and then president — was chief of the Philippine Constabulary.  

"Time pa (niya) sinusunog na yan," the former governor said. "The problem is, everytime they burn or uproot, kumakalat naman ang buto. Pag umulan, according to residents, tutubo ulit.”  

The government should instead provide good roads and irrigation systems in those villages so that people would instead grow legal crops, Baac said then.

Baac disputed allegations all local villagers within Mount Chumanchil complex in Tinglayan are involved in growing marijuana.  "Basta na lang daw tumutubo," he had said.

Marijuana plantations have also been reported in Sagada, Mountain Province and remote towns of Benguet like Kibungan and Kapangan among others.