THE ONLY HOPE OF THE FAMILY WAS KILLED ON IN ACCIDENT SHOT
A new wave of killings in the government’s antidrug campaign that has left at least 80 people dead in Metro Manila and a nearby province this week has raised alarm and outrage from both critics and allies of President Duterte.
Presidential spokesperson Ernesto Abella on Friday defended Mr. Duterte, saying the public has welcomed the “safer” streets that resulted from the war on drugs spearheaded by the Philippine National Police.
“The perspective of the President has been very clear from the very beginning. This is not a reckless exercise of bloodletting. There is a rhyme and reason in the police operations,” Abella said.
Commenting on the boy’s killing, Abella said: “That incident, happily, I think is isolated.”
A revised transcript of his statement to Malacañang reporters replaced the word “happily” with “haply,” meaning by chance or accident.
“This is not to exonerate everything that happens, but to put context in what government is doing. It is addressing what is happening on the ground to stop something that is destroying the country,” Abella said.
The Northern Police District reported 24 were killed, including 13 in Caloocan City, on Thursday and Friday in its antidrug campaign.
Several senators allied to or generally supportive of the President’s policies were jarred by the spike in the death toll and the Caloocan boy’s killing.
“It’s worrisome, to say the least, coming even from somebody who in his previous lifetime as a law enforcer was a natural suspect in violating human rights of crime suspects that we used to pursue,” Sen. Panfilo Lacson, a former PNP chief, said in a text message.
Lacson, chair of the Senate committee on public order, warned that the Senate would exercise its oversight authority with an inquiry of its own if investigations by the PNP Internal Affairs Service (IAS) and the Department of Justice were found to be a cover-up
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