Before he was gunned down, Ronnie Montoya tried to build a house. Like most of the people in the Manila suburb of Tondo, he had no money. The family had a shed – a tiny foothold in the fetid labyrinth of the slums. With materials scrounged from building sites and rubbish dumps, he added two storeys – the stairways between them crooked and treacherous, composed of a dozen different kinds of scrap timber. The ceilings were so low that the occupants had to sit or lie down.
The words painted on the staircase at the Silingan coffee shop make it clear that this place is about much more than just serving lattes and fruit smoothies. "It's not a war on illegal drugs. It's an illegal war on drugs," the sign says. Silingan means neighbor. Most of the workers at this cafe near…