FORMER Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte has remained unapologetic over his controversial anti-drug campaign during his term from June 2016 to 2022 in his first public appearance related to the ongoing Senate investigation about his drug war.
“Do not question my policies because I offer no apologies, no excuses. I did what I had to do. Whether you believe it or not, I did for my country,” the firebrand 79-year-old former president said during the hearing on October 28, 2024.
As he remained stoic during the nationally televised probe, Duterte justified that his mandate as president “was to protect the country and the Filipino people.”
“I and I alone, take full legal responsibility for everything the police had done pursuant to my order…I should be the one imprisoned,” he added.
Following Duterte’s alleged terror tactics in his anti-narcotics crackdowns, that includes encouraging police officers and even civilians with guns to shoot drug smugglers, Human Rights Watch-Asia Division senior researcher Carlos Conde said “this is all the more reason for the Ferdinand Marcos Jr. administration to cooperate with the International Criminal Court (ICC).”
“The Senate hearing, while good for the families of victims to air their grievance, is hardly the venue for justice because it is clearly being used by supporters of Duterte in the Senate to cover up or at least defend their actions in the ‘drug war,’” Conde told The Samar Chronicle.
While more than 6,000 drug personalities, mostly from poor in urban ghettos, were killed during the drug war based on government records, various human rights and media organizations estimated that the number of victims has reached 12,000 to 30,000 victims due to vigilante-style or extra-judicial killings.
‘For me, it’s good that Duterte takes responsibility for what happened. But I hope he also comes to his senses to realize how inhumane and evil it was,” said Catholic priest Christian Ofilan of the Diocese of Borongan.
“My special prayer is that he [Duterte] finally brings himself to his knees and asks God’s pardon. He is already old, but he doesn’t seem remorseful for all the abuses that had happened,” Ofilan said in a report from Catholic news site UCA News.
‘Hubris-laden testimony’
While Philippine-based rights group leader Cristina Palabay expressed their solidarity with the victims of extrajudicial killings and their families who are seeking justice and accountability from Duterte’s regime, she also said that the former president’s statements on taking legal responsibility for the consequences in the drug war “are part of his hubris-laden testimony.”
“When asked about individual deaths, he would wash his hands of his responsibility. Nothing new here – just the usual Duterte who curses through his answers when he squirms his way out of responsibility.,” Palabay, Karapatan secretary-general, told Sunstar Philippines.
“Former president Rodrigo Duterte has turned the ongoing Senate hearings on the drug war as a platform for his usual expletive-laced rants, with support from his subalterns Ronald ‘Bato’ dela Rosa and Robin Padilla, among others. The proceedings have become a three-ring circus,” she said.
“It is looking more and more that the purpose of the Senate hearings is to defuse the ticking bomb in the House of Representatives which, if allowed to reach their logical conclusion, would end up blowing up in the face of the Marcos Jr. regime,” Palabay added.
According to her, unless the Senate is able to get the proceedings on track, its hearings will end up derailing the objective of determining and exacting accountability for the tens of thousands of killings under the war on drugs.
“The current regime, after all, has not rescinded any of the policies that engendered the grave human rights violations that marked both the war on drugs and the counter-insurgency war under Duterte,” Palabay said.
In a separate statement, Palabay maintained that extrajudicial killings “have long served as a weapon wielded by state fascists to quell mass resistance and spread terror.”
“We must exact accountability not only for the horrific drug war killings under Duterte. We must attain justice for all the other horrendous extrajudicial killings perpetrated in the Philippines in furtherance of tyranny,” said Palabay, as she also called for justice for the alleged deaths of 422 political activists and the “frustrated extrajudicial killing” of 544 others.
As this developed, prominent lawyer and rights advocate Chel Diokno, who was invited as a resource person during the Oct. 28 drug war hearing with Duterte, expressed “optimism” for the victims.
“The victims and their families have long awaited this day of accountability, a moment when Duterte and his accomplices are called to answer for their crimes. Today, they will finally have a platform to share their stories with the public, unveiling the full extent of Duterte’s brutal crackdown,” Diokno said.
“Justice for Duterte’s victims also means providing healing for the survivors. Duterte’s campaign robbed them not only of their loved ones but also of their dignity. That dignity must be restored,” he added.
On March 17, 2019, the Duterte administration officially withdrew from the ICC, after the Hague-based tribunal started looking into Duterte’s drug war.
Despite the ongoing revelations of the ongoing congressional investigation on Duterte’s drug war and extra-judicial killing cases, the present Marcos Jr. administration also remained resolute that it will not return to ICC. | Samar Chronicle via Ronald O. Reyes
