Philippine National Police (PNP) Chief Director General Ronald Dela Rosa suspended Oplan Tokhang Drug War immediately last Oct. 12. Oplan Tokhang is the anti-drug war campaign launched by President Rodrigo Duterte's administration. It primarily aims to hunt drug lords.
"Tokhang" means "to approach and talk" in Visayan. This was launched to counter drug use and pushing in the Philippines. It also aims to get users to surrender and enter rehabilitation.
The suspension was due to PNP's resolution that there should be internal cleansing and crack down on riding in tandem groups. This came about two days after Duterte signed a memorandum that gave the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) the lead in all anti-illegal drug operations in the country.
Last January 2017, there was also a suspension of Oplan Tokhang and PDEA was asked to take over after the police's Anti-Illegal Drugs Group (AIDG) was dissolved, following the death of a South Korean businessman.
"Leave to the PDEA as sole agency, the conduct of all campaigns and operations against all those who, directly or indirectly, and in whatever manner or capacity, are involved in or connected with, illegal drugs," the memorandum states, which was addressed to the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI), Philippine National Police (PNP), Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), Bureau of Customs (BoC), Philippine Postal Office, and all other concerned agencies.
"In order to bring order to the operation/campaign against illegal drugs, thus pinpointing precise accountability (to PDEA)," the memorandum added. It also stated that all information related to the anti-drug campaign be, "relayed, delivered, or brought to the attention of the PDEA for its appropriate action."
PNP is now off on Oplan Tokhang Drug War and will now instead focus on other crimes. According to PNP, about 76, 863 anti-drug operations were conducted from July 1, 2016 to Sept. 26 this year, in which an estimated 113,932 were arrested and 3,906 were killed. Furthermore, over 1.3 million had surrendered as of July 25 and 3,500 were cleared of drugs as of Aug. 31.
