Meeting Manila's Crystal Meth Dealers (Excerpt from 'The Shabu Trap')
Posted
December 28, 2015
Views
127,713
Likes
746
Comments
115
Engagement
0.67%
December 28, 2015
127,713
746
115
0.67%
Every word spoken in this episode is indexed. Type any phrase to jump straight to the moment it was said.
Type any word or phrase that may have been spoken. Click a result to seek the player to that exact moment.
Try a name, a topic, or a quoted line
See what was published immediately before and after this episode.
4:09Now PlayingAt the start of 2015, Mexican national Horacio Hernandez Herrera, allegedly third in command of the infamous Sinaloa Cartel, was arrested in the Philippines’ capital, Manila, at the center of a 12 million peso ($255,000) drug bust.
Herrera’s arrest came as Philippine authorities confirmed that not only were Mexico’s cartels vying for a piece of the country’s rapidly growing drugs trade, but forming an alliance with Chinese syndicates to do so.
The Philippines drug of choice? Shabu: A local name for crystal meth, present in over 90 percent of the capital’s neighborhoods.
While shabu’s popularity has skyrocketed in the last decade — partly for its ability to allow the poorest of Filipinos to work longer hours — the drug's grip on Manila has reached crisis point, as unemployment rates remain high and the collusion of gangs with police and local government becomes an every day occurrence.
So, as Herrera awaits trial in the capital, VICE News takes a look at the Philippines drug trade. We visit the Tondo district of Manila, a port area overwhelmed by shabu, to speak to dealers defending their turf and police officers trying to contend with porous borders, stunted judiciary power, and – their most challenging enemy – corruption within their own forces.
In this excerpt, VICE News meets with the men behind a small-scale shabu operation in Manila, to explain how their business was borne out of a profound lack of opportunities, coupled with corruption in both the Philippine police and government.
Watch "Crystal Meth and Cartels in the PhilippinesThe Shabu Trap”
Read "The War on Drugs Isn't Just Destroying Lives It's Also Killing the Environment”
Subscribe to VICE News here
Check out VICE News for more
Follow VICE News here:
More videos from the VICE network
Sentinel Indexing in Progress
Metadata and chapters are available. Claim extraction for this episode is pending.
All video content is delivered via YouTube embedded players in accordance with the YouTube Terms of Service. Sentinel provides research tools that promote discovery and accountability across political media.
