Philippines new President - Rodrigo "The Punisher" Duterte

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Bomberboyokay said:
Hard to see him being a success. In less than 15 weeks he's made more unforced errors than most heads of government do in their first term. VineyIsLORD will use his popularity as a shield - an odd thing to do given he got a lower vote than Malcolm Turnbull - but George W Bush was elected twice and only the devotees think he achieved anything.
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I have seen the exact opposite. The govt departments have never operated more efficiently and the nation is uniting. The requests for bribes to do there work ceased the moment he was elected (prior to being sworn in). I have never had the pleasure of testing the court system but judges accepting bribes have been put on notice.

It would be fair to ask at what cost but that requires a relative benchmark from pre and post the election.
 
Nothing more perfectly demonstrates the futility of the war on drugs, Nixon's actual motivations for said war aside, than this. There's literally nothing that Duterte, or anyone else can do can do about other than admit the war is lost. No matter how many dealers are killed, there will always be more ready to do the job, and if by chance he manages to dismantle a big operation, somebody else will move in. It's basic supply, and demand.
 
Gough said:
Nothing more perfectly demonstrates the futility of the war on drugs, Nixon's actual motivations for said war aside, than this. There's literally nothing that Duterte, or anyone else can do can do about other than admit the war is lost. No matter how many dealers are killed, there will always be more ready to do the job, and if by chance he manages to dismantle a big operation, somebody else will move in. It's basic supply, and demand.
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Not exactly.

Philippines is not like Australia or USA. We are destination drug consumer countries.

Philippines is a transport hub. They have drug problems at a user level when it comes to meth in particular. Its cheap and nasty, and heaps of it is produced there by various international cartels, then shipped out to Australia, Mexico, USA etc.

He's attacking the funding base of some of his political rivals, and he is on the right track for that strategy to be successful. Hr won't eradicate people using drugs, but his attack on 'drugs' is not just about getting his people clean and attacking local dealers. He wants the likes of 14k, Sun Yee On etc gone from Philippines, and their funding of ethnic Chinese (among others) politicians with it.

This is only the beginning, the 700,000 who have signed up for treatment is significant. But the real fight will be when he unleashes on the kingpins - the kind of people with senators and military officials on their payroll.

I remember a triad being arrested at one of the casinos in Manila a couple of years ago. He had a few kilos of meth and a submachine gun on his person. He got away with it because the police didn't ask him for ID, so when he faced court there was no charge to answer for because they had no record of his name. The judicial corruption is out of control and that's what he is really fighting against. The environment in Manila and Cebu has been one of operating with absolute impunity for foreign cartels as long as they paid the right people. Duterte has already started a huge cleanout of the judiciary, police and military - and that's his real challenge.

Its one thing to shoot a few users and low level pushers while arresting them. You'll scare a lot of people into getting clean, and push using underground even further. Cutting the corruption out of the government is going to be a much harder fight - but its the actual fight he's trying to have. Drugs is just a way of making it more easy to understand.

An example of another minor victory: for years the customs officials at NAIA were shaking down tourists and OFW's upon leaving the country. They'd alter visas to make it look like people overstayed, asking for 10,000 pesos as a fine. Or worse, they'd place bullets in OFW's luggage and fine them significantly more to be allowed to leave for their jobs in the middle east or east asia (or Australia). As soon as Duterte was elected he said to the entire Customs office "If one more person places a bullet in someone's luggage, I'm going to fire your entire airport staff and hire new people that can do the job properly". The practice has ceased. These might seem like minor things, but he's trying to make Philippines a better place to do business and increase its standing in the region. They are going to be a powerhouse economy one way or another in the coming decades, but cleaning up corruption needs to happen. And people are sick of it.
 

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I'd have liked it a lot more if he introduced the death penalty for corrupt cops, military, politicians and judges rather than encouraging vigilantism at the street level.
 
fleabitten said:
I'd have liked it a lot more if he introduced the death penalty for corrupt cops, military, politicians and judges rather than encouraging vigilantism at the street level.
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Really? There is nothing like bringing in laws that make it easier to eradicate any dissent or opposition to his government.
 
fleabitten said:
I'd have liked it a lot more if he introduced the death penalty for corrupt cops, military, politicians and judges rather than encouraging vigilantism at the street level.
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Coming to power and immediately deposing and hanging members of the judiciary, legislative, and enforcement is not a great look either to be honest.

Going back to the drug war discussion, an interesting comparative case would be Mexico. Like the Philippines, Mexico isn't a destination country, it's a transport and manufacturing hub for supply to the US and Europe and is one of the most violent states on earth. Where does a governments responsibility lie in protecting its citizens from violence from powerful transnational non-state actors like drug cartels?

I guess I'm saying, in the context of poor and fragile states declaring "war" on drugs - where drug crime represents political power - maybe its best to characterise it as a true internal or civil war of rival power sources battling for control of future control of government in the Philippines.
 
Lebbo73 said:
Really? There is nothing like bringing in laws that make it easier to eradicate any dissent or opposition to his government.
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I'd say it's easier to do that with assassinations in the street than it is to put people on trial in a transparent court room. I wouldn't be surprised at all if it turned out some of the people on his lists were there for political reasons. It's already been acknowledged that "mistakes" have been made.

smokingjacket said:
Coming to power and immediately deposing and hanging members of the judiciary, legislative, and enforcement is not a great look either to be honest.
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True enough, but at least the accused would have a chance to defend themselves against the accusations.
 
Two local mayors involved in drug trafficking and manufacturing have been killed in the last few weeks. Not sure if the second one was in shootouts with police or with other cartels though.
 
Gough said:
And two more, probably with connections to the President take their place. Smart by Duterte, but he's about as much of a man of the people as Trump is.
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Trump dreams of being this popular. Literally.

And those mayors will be replaced via elections. Its important to note that evidence points to them both being actively involved in the trade.

So one of the shootings in particular is pretty interesting though - he was shot by police in a shootout, whilst in prison. I've seen footage of drug dealers in filipino prison having guns and even cooking meth whilst incarcerated. This one seems insane though - basically the former mayor and an accomplice opened fire on police within the prison itself, and were shot in retaliation.

Seems more than a little far fetched. Not impossible in Philippines of course, but still. Pretty insane.
 
Doss said:
If attempts aren't made on this guy's life at some point I'll be amazed.
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If it happened there would be a full blown revolt and everyone knows it. You'd be looking at civil war.
 

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VineyIsLORD said:
If it happened there would be a full blown revolt and everyone knows it. You'd be looking at civil war.
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No doubt. But he's bound to make some pretty powerful enemies and it would not surprise me if one of elite types with their fingers in dodgy pies strikes out eventually.
 
Doss said:
No doubt. But he's bound to make some pretty powerful enemies and it would not surprise me if one of elite types with their fingers in dodgy pies strikes out eventually.
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Talking to a few mates there they said most of his security detail are Americans and a few Chinese. He's basically paying a premium on security to make sure that no ex-military Filipino with ties to the ruling party can get near him.

Shades of Gaddafi lol but I don't blame him in the slightest.
 
Duterte needs to read the tea leaves as the populous want reform and "just" killing drug dealers isn't enough.

The honeymoon is over and people want more.

On the positive, corruption in the police ranks is better. Same said for judges, permitting and the tax office. Lol.....you no longer get asked to pay bribes to lodge your tax!

Fingers crossed the transition from "fear of god" to good governance begins.
 
Ah the generations old eradicate the scourge of society (druqks) mandate. Only this time lets do it by killing people unjustly, seems to me hes on the right track. At least everybody be off the druqks and drukqs trade lol. You take away the money to be made from drugs and manage it yourself (Government) and you win plain and simple. The fact is people have a demand for drugs, its human to take drugs, its in our history. This will never change so long as freedom itself exists. There will always be a market for recreational drug use, even with a change of government attitudes and more education for the citizens. Organised crime (basically opportunistic business) gets it, but why has it taken government so long to come around? Oh wait they still think they can tell everyone what to do with their bodies in the name of ''freedom''. And they still havent given up yet. And they still missing out on so much $$$. This guy will just be another on a long list of failed ''GET RID OF DRUKQS'' politicians. If we cant do it what chance do the poverty stricken countries have? Coz thats what its all about.... $$. And until the country this guy ''manages'' is out of complete and utter poverty they will have no chance to make any change. Its too damn lucrative even with death hanging over your head.
 
He has just announced free birth control for Filipino women.

Catholic church is pissed. They are also pissed about his war on drugs and his overtures to Communist China.

I suppose that will teach them for molesting him as a kid.
 
How dare a country of 100 million people packed in like sardines try and slow down the birth rate. Preposterous, says the Catholic Church.
 
Doss said:
How dare a country of 100 million people packed in like sardines try and slow down the birth rate. Preposterous, says the Catholic Church.
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yep

Unfortunately it goes against the grain of the church as the church sells "hope". If people aren't desperate, they don't need hope.

Big families, keeps people poor, desperate and in need of hope!
 
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