Cops uproot 25,489 marijuana shrubs in Lanao del Sur
TIMRA Reports • 21:00 PM Sun Feb 19, 2023
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By:
John M. Unson
Policemen immediately burned the marijuana plants found in Maguing, Lanao del Sur. (From Lanao del Sur PPO)
COTABATO CITY --- Policemen on Friday uprooted 25, 489 marijuana shrubs planted in rows in a secluded hinterland in Maguing town in Lanao del Sur.
Brig. Gen. John Guyguyon, director of the Police Regional Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region, told reporters Sunday the teams involved in the operation in Barangay Bato-Bato immediately set the marijuana plants on fire after collecting specimen to be used as evidence in prosecuting its propagators.
Guyguyon said their anti-narcotics operatives placed at no less than P5 million the value of the confiscated marijuana plants.
The operation was launched after residents of Maguing informed officials of the Lanao del Sur Provincial Police Office about the propagation of marijuana plants in Barangay Bato-Bato by an armed group with links to the Dawlah Islamiya.
The Dawlah Islamiya is a local terrorist group fashioned from the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, blamed for deadly bombings in central Mindanao in the past five years.
Municipal officials and barangay leaders said the armed men guarding the marijuana plants scampered away when they sensed that combined personnel of the provincial police and the Maguing Municipal Police Station and policemen from different units of PRO-BAR were approaching their location from three directions.
“Credit for the successful uprooting of the marijuana plants has to go to vigilant residents of Maguing helping us prevent planting of marijuana in the municipality by criminal gangs,” Guyguyon said.
The municipal police force is now validating the identities of the persons who owned the marijuana farm that police teams destroyed last Friday, to be charged with violation of the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002.