In a public statement, President Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos Jr. took pride in a recent big haul of shabu, saying: “We do not kill people that are just suspected of having to do with drugs. We are handling the drug problem in a different way.”

The statement, of course, is a direct attribution to the drug war waged by his predecessor, former President Rodrigo R. Duterte. Marcos and Duterte live in different worlds.

Ilocos Norte is a first-class province with a population of 609,588 and a land area of 3,418.75 square kilometers. Its capital, Laoag City, has a population of 111,651.

Davao is a highly urbanized city with a land area of 2,443 square kilometers and a population of 1,776,949. It is the largest city in the country in terms of land area, which makes it four times bigger than Metro Manila and the most populous outside of the National Capital Region.

The center of activity in Ilocos Norte is Laoag City where, as governor, Marcos Jr. spent most of his time. Its population is smaller than any urban barangay of Davao City.

Ilocos Norte’s gross domestic product (GDP) is placed at P101.07 billion, while Davao City’s GDP is P532.54 billion. llocos Norte registered P122,330 per capita GDP, while Davao City’s per capita GDP is P271,958.

Davao is the commercial and communications center of Mindanao. Ilocos Norte is where the late President Ferdinand E. Marcos Sr. was laid out in a refrigerated glass coffin until then-President Duterte, who is now the political nemesis of his son, had him buried in the Libingan ng mga Bayani over the objections of the political opposition and human rights activists.

Before Duterte took the helm of the Davao City government, the southern capital was a hotbed of the communist insurgency, during whose murderous reign the city was dubbed the “killing field” of the Philippines.

The separatist fronts spilled out all over the Davao region, carrying out bombings of churches, public places, ports and buses. The city was not spared the terrorist activities of extremists and the scourge of drugs and crime victimizing schoolchildren.

Duterte dealt with each not from a position of weakness and acquiescence but with confrontational courage. “Live in peace or leave my city and do your thing elsewhere,” he warned. At night, Duterte, the mayor, would change his garb and drive his Holiday taxi around the dingy nooks of the city in search of thugs out to create trouble.

The above is a long predicate to illustrate the whale of a difference between the brand of leadership, courage, lifestyle and decision-making of former president Duterte and incumbent President Marcos.

The frequency of recent shipments of shabu clearly indicates that the drug syndicates are back with impunity, encouraged by the toothless and complacent way the drug problem is being addressed in the country. Meaning, leave it to the fishermen to retrieve contraband they may spot in the high seas despite 250 Coast Guard vessels patrolling an area of about 266,000 square kilometers. But Marcos cannot count on fishing boats to make apprehensions for, in fact, the recent big haul of P10 billion worth of shabu was loaded on a fishing boat.

One of Duterte’s legacies is the eradication of drug laboratories and dens. While mayor of Davao, he personally led a raid on a shabu laboratory that led to the death of three Chinese chemists who operated the lab. When shipments of drugs kept coming to Davao City from Lanao, he motored there and warned the local officials “not to f-ck” with his city.

Two rehabilitation centers were established in Davao. Heads of families who underwent rehab were given an allowance of P2,500 per month. Duterte took his war against illegal drugs nationwide when he became president, resulting in the neutralization and arrest of more than 8,000 high-value targets. An estimated 1.2-million addicts gave themselves up and were rehabilitated.

Marcos came at a time when the drug and crime syndicates had been virtually wiped out. Halfway through his six-year term, however, drug deliveries are back. Some of these were fished out of the seas but the ocean is too wide. If three or five cargoes of illegal drugs are scooped up from the seas, twice that volume may be finding their way into the hands of the syndicates to be quietly peddled in the streets of who knows where.