Duterte is in the Hague and the Philippines is in flux

Hello friends!

Do you think you’ll remember where you were when Duterte was flown to the Hague? I think I will. Sweltering in Jakarta as a push notification came through and I yelled over the top of everyone. What a moment in history! I’m very nervous about what comes next but we get so few moments of justice on this planet that I think we should enjoy what we can while we can. 

Today I’ve taken a look at sort of where we’re at Monday morning. There’s obviously a lot going on here and I haven’t touched on how communities affected by extrajudicial killings have responded, for instance, or the incredible impact it has made on the midterms already. But this is long and meandering enough so let’s call it a part one and revisit. 

Also, thank you to everyone who let me know this newsletter is how they got the news! That’s a lovely closed-circle moment for me and Dari Mulut ke Mulut, which launched in the weeks leading up to Duterte’s election in 2016. 

See you later in the week, I have a plane to get.
Erin Cook

Duterte to the Hague, everyone else to battle stations

Rodrigo Duterte was never going to go quietly, was he? Warning police they’d have to kill him and to expect lawsuits as they detained him at the Philippine air base on Tuesday, Duterte looked more like a caught catfish flopping around desperate for water than the strongman with a death toll and a thousand headlines behind him. His bravado got him elected, but it’ll get him done now.

He’d spoken last weekend at a rally for supporters in Hong Kong that an International Criminal Court warrant was probably coming down the pipeline. Questions about jurisdiction and sovereignty are entirely reasonable, but coming from him just seemed like desperate bravado. Vice President Sara Duterte insists he never considered running to China and seeking out asylum, though I think we’ll never know for sure. I suspect, based solely on how Duterte dealt with China during his term, that feelers may have gone out, but Beijing would not have been receptive. 

Instead, there he was, confronted at Manila’s Ninoy Aquino International Airport and told he’ll be going to the Hague imminently. It resulted in a 12-hour stand-off, Police Maj. Gen. Nicolas Torre told reporters, that went so exactly as how you’d imagine let me quote the Associated Press in full: ‘“It was very tense,” Torre told The Associated Press. “One of my officers sustained a head injury after being hit hard with a cellphone” by Duterte’s common-law wife “and his daughter was cursing me with expletives, but I kept my cool.”’

After all the argy-bargy, he got on the plane to the Hague. A plane much nicer than any of us will ever go on, mind, and they still whinged the whole time. His arrival in the Netherlands was greeted with both supporters and haters. Reuters photographer Wolfgang Rattay was on the scene and produced some spectacular snaps of supporters. 

Getting there is only the start. Duterte’s legal team says they were never shown a warrant and the ICC has no jurisdiction over this case, given the Philippines is not party to the court — after Duterte removed the country from it. This is where the tricky politics comes in and we need to split the hair that it’s obviously in part politically motivated by the Marcos administration, but Duterte totally does need to answer for his crimes. 

Senator Imee Marcos, sister of the president and friend of the vice-president, wants a Senate investigation committee into how this has all worked out. “I am calling for an urgent investigation into the arrest, an issue that has deeply divided the nation... It is imperative to establish whether due process was followed,” she said in a statement today provided to ABS-CBN. The relationships involved are tricky, but I think this is not a bad idea. Transparency, transparency, transparency! Whether we get that and not just grandstanding is another thing, though. 

A trial in the Philippines comes with a hell of a lot of baggage and would be a genuine security nightmare. Does that mean the Philippines should farm it out to the ICC? I can’t wait to read all the big brains weigh in. Over on Bluesky, National Historical Commission of the Philippines senior researcher Kristoffer Pasion noted that having it physically removed paired with the slow and deliberate judicial processes, means the wind could be taken out of the sails of the more fanatical supporters, allowing for a cooling off as the Philippines “shifts to more immediate concerns.” 

That might be prescient. Duterte faced the court for the first time Friday via video link. ABS CBN reports Presiding Judge Iulia Motoc allowed him to appear in absentia, owing to the long flight from the Hague. There, he simply confirmed his name and date of birth as the charges were read out to him. Motoc set a pre-trial date of September 23 to confirm those charges. 

The Inquirer spoke to ICC-accredited lawyer Joel Butuyan over the weekend, who noted the long gap in hearings allows the Duterte defence to piece it all together. “Usually, what will happen is that they will file their challenge and the [ICC] prosecutor is going to … submit its counterarguments and then the ICC, the Pre-Trial Chamber, is going to rule,” he told the paper.

Already, Sara Duterte announced the family secured British-Israeli lawyer Nicholas Kaufman for his defence. 

Senator Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa might be sniffing around for one of Kaufman’s colleagues. The long-time Duterte ally has not been served with a warrant at this stage, as a former police chief with some very dirty hands in the war on drugs, dela Rosa was mentioned numerous times in the Duterte warrant. Dela Rosa’s involvement in these things goes back beyond Duterte’s presidency to his time in Davao and the notorious Davao Death Squads. 

Dela Rosa petitioned the Supreme Court on March 11 to prevent the government from assisting the ICC in its investigations — a move legal experts told the Inquirer could be seen as an admission of guilt. “He’s speculating and in a way it’s almost like an extrajudicial confession of guilt that he’s about to be arrested and he doesn’t want the Philippine government to cooperate with the ICC and have him arrested,” Ruben Carranza of the International Center for Transitional Justice said. This Inquirer piece is really, really good so if you’re keen to go in deep on the early years, do read. 

Monday morning, Dela Rosa confirmed he would turn himself in if and when senate protection of him ends, ABS-CBN reports. “I dont wan't to engage with my former subordinates in a gunfight. It’s gonna be useless,” Dela Rosa said. Is that literal or figurative, who can say! That you could even ask says a lot. 

As expected, Davao City, hometown of the Duterte clan, turned out to protest in support of their former mayor. ‘Several thousand’ turned out yesterday for the annual Araw ng Dabaw celebration of the city’s founding turning it into a demonstration demanding Duterte’s return. They were joined by Duterte’s son, Davao City Mayor Sebastian “Baste” Duterte, and ally-turned-pizza-deliveryman Bong Go. 

“My father had your father buried [at the Libingan ng mga Bayani], but you had my father jailed. You son of a bitch,” Baste said, referring to Duterte’s approval of reburying Bongbong Marcos’ father, Ferdinand, at the cemetery for national heroes, the Manila Standard reports.

Battlelines between the two clans were drawn a year ago. I don’t know what you’d even call it now.