November 23, 2025 | 2:02pm
COTABATO CITY — Anti-narcotics agents seized P600,000 worth of compressed marijuana bricks from a warehouse of a cargo forwarding firm in Barangay Salimbao, Sultan Kudarat, Maguindanao del Norte, on Saturday, November 22.
The operation by the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency–Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (PDEA-BARMM) that led to the confiscation involved a parcel containing five bricks of marijuana, each weighing one kilogram. The raid was based on tips from informants who reported that the shipment was destined for a retailer in Cotabato City, coming from a supplier outside Maguindanao del Norte.
Benjamin Recites III, director of PDEA-BARMM, told reporters on Sunday that their agents, together with units of the Bangsamoro regional police, are working to identify the actual sender and recipient of the illegal parcel.
Recites said their agents located the parcel among a pile of packages inside the cargo forwarding warehouse using a narcotics-sniffing dog.
The management of the cargo forwarding firm assured PDEA-BARMM of their cooperation in identifying those behind the foiled attempt to ship P600,000 worth of compressed marijuana leaves, apparently from another region, to a contact in Cotabato City.
Recites added that PDEA-BARMM agents also seized P102,000 worth of shabu from a dealer apprehended in a separate operation on Saturday in upland Wao town, Lanao del Sur, which was planned with the assistance of municipal and provincial officials.
Recites said the 41-year-old suspect was immediately frisked and handcuffed by agents after selling P102,000 worth of shabu, weighing 15 grams, during a transaction in a secluded area in Wao, one of Lanao del Sur’s 39 towns.
The suspect is now in a detention facility, awaiting prosecution for violations of the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002.