‘Paralyzed’

Let us, for the sake of argument, suppose that the Parojinog clan is involved in illegal drugs, that its wealth and political stature is built on the illegal proceeds of organized crime, that the mayor of Ozamiz City was, as President Duterte has charged, a drug lord through and through.

Do all these justify the killing of Mayor Reynaldo Parojinog Sr., and 14 others, in a predawn police operation conducted for the purpose of serving search warrants?

The official response, from Philippine National Police chief Director General Ronald de la Rosa on down, is that the Parojinogs and their bodyguards fought back; in the ensuing shootout, all 15 died, while the police sustained no wounds or casualties. (The unofficial response, from supporters of President Duterte’s so-called war on drugs, ranges from a hearty affirmation of the police version to full-throated denunciation of the Parojinogs, welcoming their extermination by whatever means.)

But even if none of the 15 (Parojinog, his wife Susan, his sister Mona, his brother Octavio and 11 security men or supporters) had fought back, would their supposed involvement in illegal drugs and other forms of organized crime justify killing them?

Anyone who has spent even a little time in comment threads and social media timelines would know that there would be no shortage of Filipinos (or bots impersonating Filipinos) who would loudly and quickly answer yes. The reason of choice would likely be: Think of all the death and damage these drug peddlers have caused!

Killing these men and women, however, is a shortcut, and it will cause, not the permanent end of organized crime in Ozamiz and surrounding areas, but only a temporary ceasing. Three reasons:

In the first place, cutting off the head of an alleged criminal syndicate means leaving the body, and the syndicate’s links to other criminal networks, intact.

The reason why proper police procedure requires arresting the criminal masterminds alive is precisely to determine the true scope of the syndicate and to trace all existing links.

But, assuming that Mayor Parojinog was in fact exactly what his reputation made him out to be, keeping him alive would have been in the best interests of law enforcement.

The possibility of Parojinog confessing pivotal information, that would have led to the unravelling of an entire web of criminal networks, is gone — because putting a bullet (or several) in his head was more convenient.

For a time, the foot soldiers of Parojinog’s alleged criminal organization would feel disoriented, even disempowered, but in time they will find, or will be found by, new criminal enterprises.

Secondly, the Parojinogs created a Robin Hood reputation for themselves, and like the misguided citizens who fall for the martyrdom narrative of the Maute Group and other extremists, some of the family’s constituents, similarly misguided, will feel that an injustice had been done to them, and this sense, however mistaken, will feed the discontent that leads, every now and then, to ordinary people welcoming Robin Hood personalities.

Our point: If the Duterte administration were really serious about rooting out the scourge of illegal drugs, it should carry a big stick but pay special attention to the rule of law.

In the end, and even though it will take a long time, it is the rigorous, dispassionate application of already existing protocols that will lead to the permanent, not merely temporary, end of organized crime.

The administration shouldn’t make the mistake of thinking that popular support for the assault on the illegal drugs trade is a sweeping permission to do anything; the same surveys show that many Filipinos do not trust the police, that as much as three-fourths of all voting-age Filipinos do not want mere suspects to be killed, that about the same proportion say they worry that they will be the next victim, the next casualty, in this so-called war.

The third reason then: The killing of the Parojinogs and their bodyguards may have caused a sense of shock and awe among Filipinos, but it will also add to the sense of imminent personal danger.

If the police can blithely declare that they “paralyzed” the CCTV cameras during the operation so that their personnel won’t be identified, what will ordinary Filipinos think — at night, away from any camera — when they worry about who the next person will end up dead?