Cocaine worth P6 M seized in Cagayan

APARRI, Cagayan — A joint team of the Cagayan police and the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) seized the other day 1.2 kilos of high-grade cocaine valued at P6 million on Camiguin Island here.

Superintendent Rodrigo de Gracia, Cagayan police director, told The STAR that the cocaine, contained in a water-proof plastic pouch, was seen floating in the waters off Barangay Linao East by a fisherman whose identity was withheld.

The fisherman, De Gracia said, took and hid the plastic pouch for a few days but later disclosed his find to barangay officials for fear that he might be suspected of being a drug pusher.

The fisherman told probers that he saw armed men on board several unmarked motorboats scouring the waters of Camiguin Island a day after he found the cocaine.

A joint team led by Superintendent Alex Rafael, group director of the First Provincial Mobile Group, and Superintendent Rolen Balquin, PDEA regional director, rushed to Camiguin Island, some six kilometers from this capital town, when Cagayan Gov. Edgar Lara confirmed the cocaine haul.

According to PDEA agents, the cocaine has 70 percent high-grade quality and has an estimated street value of at least P6 million.

In Basco, Batanes, police reported that the Coast Guard also retrieved a plastic pouch containing two kilos of cocaine the other week.

De Gracia suspects that the cocaine found in both Basco and Camiguin had come from a single source.

Meanwhile, Chief Superintendent Jefferson Soriano, Cagayan Valley police director, has ordered Superintendent Jonathan Ablang, regional intelligence and investigation chief, to deploy police intelligence agents to validate reports that unmarked vessels have been frequenting the waters of Camiguin and Fuga islands.

Soriano also directed the police directors of Cagayan and Batanes to intensify intelligence gathering and patrolling of waters between the two provinces to drive away poachers and smugglers.