Former Police Colonel Royina Garma and current Commissioner of the National Police Commission (NAPOLCOM) Edilberto Leonardo are being pointed to as the masterminds of the extrajudicial killings (EJKs) which happened during the time of former president Rodrigo Roa Duterte (PRRD). Garma and Leonardo, who have the reputation within their ranks, are being tagged in the killing of three Chinese drug lords in the Davao Penal Colony back in 2016.
Royina Garma was the former station police head in Sta. Ana, Davao City, where she presumably started her close relationship with Duterte. She became the chief of police of Cebu City as well as the Central Visayas regional command head of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG). Leonardo on the other hand, served as the Davao City regional director of CIDG. This is where Garma and Leonardo started to operate together as they rose in the police ranks and conducted operations together.
Leonardo and Garma were able to quickly rise in rank because of their closeness with PRRD. After serving as Davao City regional director, Leonardo was appointed by Duterte as the Commissioner of the NAPOLCOM. For Garma, she was appointed as general manager of the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) by Duterte, even though she had 10 years of service left with the police force. Garma was so confident that she will be appointed as PCSO general manager that she retired early from police service even with 10 years left.
Garma’s reputation precedes her. When she was appointed as chief of police in Cebu City, the EJKs in the city rose to 198 individuals killed. Now, she is also being implicated as the mastermind of the killing of former PCSO Corporate Secretary Wesley Barayuga. Barayuga was killed because he was close in exposing the corruptions within PCSO, which includes siphoning money from PCSO to fund the drug war. To avoid a scandal, Barayuga was killed. Even after his death, Barayuga was included in the narcolist of the Duterte administration, containing a list of names of people involved in drugs.
In truth, Barayuga was a good, simple and humble man. He was never involved in drugs and Barayuga lived a simple life. Even as a high-ranking official in PCSO, he only commuted to work. But Duterte saw him as an enemy and he used the EJK as a convenient excuse to carry out vindictive killings over his enemies.
Leonardo and Garma’s hands are stained with the blood of the countless individuals they killed, all in the hopes of currying favor from PRRD. They were blinded by loyalty and the fake promise of cleansing the Philippines of its drug problems.
