Poor get hit early in Duterte-inspired crackdown

In a crackdown b`earing the Philippine president-elect’s name, police have rounded up hundreds of children or their parents to enforce a night curfew for minors, and taken away drunk and shirtless men roaming metropolitan Manila’s slums. 
The poor, who were among Rodrigo Duterte’s strongest supporters, are getting a foretaste of the war against crime he has vowed to wage.
During a surprise sweep witnessed by The Associated Press last week, a girl who appeared to be about 10 years old was dragged to a police van for curfew violation. She protested that she had been outside only to take out the garbage. 
A boy about the same age cried, “I do not want to go!” A slightly older-looking boy, looking terrified, dropped the box of a rice and beef meal he’d just bought when police apprehended him.
A bewildered mother sleeping on a sidewalk with her toddler wailed when a social worker took her son, and she was dragged to a police vehicle. 
“Where is my child? I will go crazy here!” she shouted, pleading with police to “please have mercy on me.”
The woman wore a rubber bracelet bearing Duterte’s name. She relaxed when a social worker brought her son to the same vehicle.
The crackdown is dubbed “Oplan Rody.” Oplan is short for operation plan, while Rody is both an acronym for “Rid the Streets of Drinkers and Youth” and the nickname of Duterte, who becomes president June 30.
In the weeks since the tough-talking mayor of southern Davao city won the presidential election, energized police and local officials have dusted off little-enforced city ordinances like night-to-dawn curfews for minors.
Rolando Roxas, father of a 14-year-old boy apprehended while buying noodles, said it’s probably a good lesson for the children not to roam the streets at night.
But Jocelyn Chavez is angry. She is a small-time vendor who works at night to support her five children, and she had to forego her day’s earnings to get her daughter, who she said was picked up while taking out the garbage. 
“If I don’t work we will all have nothing to eat,” she said.
Apprehended minors are turned over to social workers and most are released to their parents with warnings. Adults caught outdoors are warned the first time and can be fined, detained or both the next, said Police Chief Inspector Bernabe Irinco Jr., who led the Manila operations.
“We are doing this so our young people can be free of crimes,” Irinco said.
Tough talk on crime helped Duterte win the May 9 election by a wide margin and has resonated with the poor, whose neighborhoods suffer the most from drugs and related crimes. Human-rights watchdogs fear his promise to replicate crime-fighting measures he used in Davao may lead to widespread rights violations.

Source: Arab News