“Narco-terrorist Hunter” At The Helm Of Highland CAR’s Drug War

June 22, 2020 Community Billboard

BAGUIO CITY (June 20, 2020) – Known by the drug underworld as “the narco-terrorist hunter”, Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) Director II Gil Cesario Castro, is taking the helm of the highland Cordillera region’s fight against drug.

From a drug supply decline cum drug personalities reduction template, Dir. Castro, who in 2017 successfully led PDEA agents in Central Mindanao overran BIFF, MILF and AKP terrorists who were “dealing drugs to fund terror” said, “ito and science-based yardstick to measure the drug war (in the Cordillera).” ‘We need to know if we are really winning (it),’ he explained.

The drug problem in the Cordillera is still hinged on marijuana plantations, the drug war veteran but still boyish looking Castro said, “recognizing its link with the economic conditions in the highlands and yet still the underlying problem when it comes to drugs, he admitted.

While the shabu supply “is being fetched from nearby provinces on a need and demand basis”. The highland Cordillera is still the country’s biggest producer of marijuana, accounting to at least 85 percent of the marijuana supply in the country, according to authorities.

With anti-drug campaign by the PDEA in Central Mindanao where he led agents drive away drug personalities, Castro equated, “the supply was significantly reduced, and the price went beyond common people’s reach.”

Young at 46 to become a veteran of the government’s anti-drug war, the boyish looking Castro was a PNP Highway Patrol Group (HPG) recruit in 2000. ”Pero 2002 na kami graduate dahil sinabak kami sa EDSA 2 Revolution at sa Malacanang seige nung 2001.” He graduated top of his class of 72 HPG recruits coming from all over the country.

“From A Rider To A Drug Lord Hunter” Castro began his colorful career in the national police in various positions, most in operations, intelligence and counter-intelligence, then detailed into the PDEA when the government’s primary anti-drug agency was born in 2002. “We were on special detail as Anti- Illegal Drugs Special Operation Task Force to support PDEA.”

Then, he was invited to join as organic personnel into the main government agency fighting the drug problem. “Kaya kami ang pioneer ng PDEA”. In 2009 PDEA formed “Task Force Salman” with Castro in tow that went after the drug ring angle of the Ampatuans in Maguindanao in 2009.

“Our composite team raided the mansion of Andal Sr. where most of the armada were accounted,” he recalled. From Maguindanao, he was recalled to Metro Manila in 2010 to become the Assistant Regional Director for PDEAMetro Manila Region, “where drug slum areas as ultimate consumers of drugs” were overran as pro-active operations, he said. “That subsequently improved crime and drugs situation in the Metropolis.”

Then back home to Baguio City from 2011-2012 as acting Regional Director of PDEACAR, where long time drug player Bernard Oliveros, in his 50’s, tagged as Baguio City’s drug trade godfather was caught and convicted; Teddy Villareal, the shabu king along barangay Pacdal; shabu tiangge supplier Tracy Lac-amen and the notorious Bambico brothers, were all hauled to jail. Baguio City’s infamous Nider and Ibarra drug dealing families were also “neutralized” under his direction.

Castro’s brief stint at the International Cooperation and Foreign Affairs (ICFAS) in 2013 in coordination with the Interpol saw the arrest and deportation of Lee Man Kuan and Eum Yun Soon, both most wanted for drug smuggling in the Asia- Pacific region.

When he came back to Cordillera as PDEA assistant regional director, Castro did not “blink an eye” in leading PDEA agents swoop down on Ifugao drug kingpin Peter Ambujon and alleged warlord Virgilio Gunnawa in Kalinga, while taking on the West African Drug Syndicated (WADS) which tried to make Baguio City the center of their operations in Northern Luzon in 2014.

WADS is an international drug smuggling organization recruiting and utilizing female drug couriers or mules. Castro said his US training in tracking down terrorist financing and the close interplay of narcotics and terrorism and studies at the International Law Enforcement Academy in Bangkok, Thailand fuel his background on dealing “face-to-face” with local and domestic drug woes.

Above all, his love for his country, “free from drugs someday”, is his dream.

Artemio A. Dumlao/ABN