The infamous Davao Death Squad (DDS) has once again received national attention during the latest Quad Committee hearing, which featured former Senator and Justice Secretary Leila De Lima as a resource person. De Lima corroborated former Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) General Manager Royina Garma’s claim that Duterte’s drug war was patterned after the DDS and Davao model.
The DDS was composed of law enforcement officers who were involved in the summary executions of individuals suspected of crimes and drug dealings while former President Rodrigo Duterte was mayor of Davao City.
The Davao model, on the other hand, refers to a system that involves payments and rewards to incentivize police officers for these killings. De Lima said that this Davao model was used by Duterte to fight illegal drugs during his term as mayor of Davao City. According to De Lima, Duterte was directly involved, as he personally issued kill orders and provided the reward money directly to the police officers after a successful kill.
This reward system used to incentivize the killings in Davao City was expanded nationwide when Duterte became President in 2016. During his presidency, Duterte pushed for a broader crackdown on drug-related crimes, resulting in a surge of extrajudicial killings across the Philippines.
It is important to remember that thousands of victims were killed during the Duterte administration. Police officers often justified these deaths by using the “nanlaban” concept, which suggested that the victims attempted to fight back, allegedly leaving the police with no choice but to kill them.
During the Quad Committee hearing, De Lima was asked about this concept. She revealed that the “nanlaban” narrative was initially developed by the DDS who would claim that their victims fought back, supposedly leaving them no choice but to kill them in self-defense.
On a national scale, the “nanlaban” excuse became a staple during the drug war. The police officers executing such drug war were motivated by the reward system, as they received money for every successful kill. They used the “nanlaban” excuse as a convenient tool to justify reckless killings. It is no wonder that drug-related killings reached unprecedented heights during the Duterte administration. Clearly, the “nanlaban” narrative and the reward system complement each other.
The link between the DDS, the Davao Model and Duterte’s national drug war is critical to understanding how these extrajudicial killings were executed on a national level. The testimonies of Garma and De Lima reveal a system in which extrajudicial killings were accepted, protected and rewarded and they could provide a basis for charges of crimes against humanity or extrajudicial killings against Duterte, given the systematic nature of the killings.
