THE Liberal Party on Tuesday called on the government of President Rodrigo R. Duterte to heed the advice of the country’s opposition leader about the drug war, saying the reckless killings of drug suspects will not solve the menace.

While it is true the country’s illegal drug problem won’t be solved by mere talk, “it also won’t be solved by the reckless killings and the rise of orphans, widows and parents who are robbed of their children,” Liberal Party Secretary General and Quezon City Rep. Jose Christopher Y. Belmonte said in a statement in Filipino.

Senator Christopher Lawrence T. Go on Monday said he doubted Vice President Maria Leonor G. Robredo’s findings about the drug campaign that she briefly headed last year.

“Between one person using her own computation giving a grade of 1%, and 79% of Filipinos who said they are satisfied with our campaign, I will choose to believe the latter,” Mr. Go, Mr Duterte’s former aide, said in a statement.

Ms. Robredo, the opposition leader whom Mr. Duterte put in charge of his drug war in November — only to fire her weeks after because he said he didn’t trust her — this week said the campaign has failed, with only 1% of illegal drugs seized by police. She also cited inconsistencies in drug data released by different agencies.

“The truth can’t be changed by petty quarrels,” Mr. Belmonte said. “Only 1% of the drug supply was seized in the past three years, compared with the more than 6,000 who died.”

The congressman said this showed there’s something wrong with the government’s anti-illegal drug campaign.

Ms. Robredo correctly advised the government to go after big-time drug suppliers and focus on prevention, rehabilitation and reintegration, he said.

“If Senator Bong Go and the administration is serious about controlling illegal drugs, they will stop the reckless killings because it’s clear this is not the solution,” Mr. Belmonte said. — C.A. Tadalan

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