EDITORIAL — Go ahead, resign

As the tumult continues over the dramatic turnover of Rodrigo Duterte to the International Criminal Court through the Interpol, the Philippine National Police has been busy denying what it describes as fake news about PNP members resigning over the arrest of the former president.

Duterte continues to enjoy a measure of support in the country, and it is not improbable that there are PNP members who sympathize with him. But if there is a grain of truth in the stories about the planned resignations over his turnover to the Interpol and to the ICC, the PNP would be better off letting such members go, and replacing them ASAP.

Such PNP members would have likely participated in the operations that led to the killing of thousands of people on mere suspicion of involvement in the illegal drug trade, and who ostensibly resisted arrest or nanlaban. Or else they are PNP members who see nothing wrong with extrajudicial short cuts to law enforcement.

Purging the PNP of such members should have been done before Duterte launched his bloody Oplan Tokhang crackdown during his presidency. The architect of Tokhang, his first PNP chief and now senator Ronald dela Rosa, has publicly acknowledged that the failure to first conduct a purge of the PNP before the crackdown was launched led to abuses in the war on drugs.

Dela Rosa, however, said they were pressed for time, since Duterte had promised during his campaign to eliminate the drug problem in six months. PNP housecleaning had to wait.

And wait. And wait. By the time Duterte’s six years in power were up, the PNP had recorded the killing of over 6,000 people in law enforcement operations nationwide. Human rights groups believe the actual number could be as high as 30,000.

The victims included teenagers who were summarily executed, children caught in the crossfire, four sons in one family, fathers and their sons, and a South Korean businessman kidnapped for ransom in the guise of a drug sting and executed right inside the PNP headquarters at Camp Crame.

Surely not all of them fought back against the arresting officers. And even for those who did, don’t the rules of engagement require the police to shoot to disable rather than to kill? Lawmakers recently received testimony bolstering reports of a quota and reward system in the PNP for killing drug suspects.

Did the six-year extermination campaign put an end to the illegal drug scourge? Of course it did not. But it could have promoted impunity in the use of extrajudicial killings in law enforcement. Cops who miss what they deem as the good old days of EJKs should do the PNP a favor and resign.