Seasoned actor Lou Veloso stars in the feature film "Mina-anud" as the skipper of a fishing boat in Eastern Samar who accidentally caught cocaine bricks. The film will be in theaters on August 21 this year. (Screencap from the recent trailer from Mina-anud Facebook account)
MANILA – Some of us lived a hard life that we have spent days praying for a miracle to happen -- a miracle big enough that it could transform our miseries to pleasures. And sometime in 2009, for a group of fishermen in Eastern Samar, million-dollar luck was washed ashore.
Surely though, it did not come from the heavens but from one of those sailing yachts owned by drug cartels operating worldwide. There were more cocaine bricks that ended on the coast but authorities were only able to recover 591 kilograms of the illegal drug worth PHP3.58 billion.
Cebuano filmmaker Kerwin Go’s debut film "Mina-anud" features the real-life story of the locals in this not-so-crowded surfing town whose lives and principles changed after being confronted by an opulent opportunity.
It is also a thrilling chase between the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) and fishermen, surfers-turned-cocaine peddlers -- and the latter in a bad position to choose whether to give up the dangerous moneymaking gig or go back to a peaceful yet completely unadorned existence.
To hit the cinemas on August 21, 2019, the film also offers a good peek into the truth that PDEA has always warned the Philippines about -- being at the center of illegal drugs in the region.
"These drug triads are making the Philippines their playground. They are resorting to drug smuggling, either finished product or raw materials, and cook shabu in high seas because of the dismantling of several major shabu laboratories offshore lately," PDEA chief, Director General Aaron Aquino said in a previous media interview.
Aquino believes the rise in the number of cocaine coming into the country this year may be a diversionary tactic, adding the shift of focus to cocaine could allow drug syndicates to ship other illegal drugs.
PDEA data in 2016 showed that cocaine remained a distant choice for Filipinos. Based on drug-related arrests, shabu (methamphetamine) remains the top choice at 94.93 percent, followed by marijuana at 5.23 percent, and other drugs, including cocaine, at 0.34 percent.
Shabu is known as a poor man's cocaine.
But then again, cocaine is the preferred drug of the rich, which might explain the supposedly low demand in the country. One kilo of cocaine costs PHP5.3 million or approximately USD101,000. (PNA)
