International court waits for Duterte

Rodrigo Duterte steps down as president of the Philippines in June 2022. He will be 77, and plans a quiet, non-eventful retirement. That’s unlikely.

Nipping at his heels are the prosecutors at the International Criminal Court in The

Hague. Apart from being a foul-mouthed, rude, socially unacceptable, misogynistic, populist politician, Duterte is the man behind thousands of extra-judicial murders. First during his 22 years as mayor of Davao and then as president. He does not deny the accusation. He revels in it.

When Duterte became mayor of Davao it was just a few murders away from the title of crime capital of the Philippines. When he left it was the safest city in the country and internationally ranked just behind those peace havens of Singapore, Seoul and Tokyo.

How? Officially sanctioned death squads. The city government took on the role of murdering suspected murderers, drug dealers and other criminals to lower the crime rate. There were no arrests, trials or imprisonments.

It worked, and made him popular with the voters of Davao, who returned him to office six times. It also produced a record that appealed to Filipino voters, who swept Duterte into the presidential palace in 2016.

Duterte reckoned that what worked in a city could work across the nation. What came to be known as the Duterte Death Squads spread across the Philippines. The exact number of people they killed is open to debate. The Filipino police talk about 6,000. The UN Commissioner for Human Rights puts the figure at 8,600. Human Rights Watch talks about a staggering 27,000.

Duterte has claimed that he personally went around Davao

looking for drug dealers to kill, and in the past said he killed at least three men suspected of kidnapping and rape.

You would think that such a ruthless regime would be unpopular with the voters. Not in the Philippines. The country has struggled with crime and corruption for decades. Official police figures show Duterte’s extra-judicial tactics have more than halved the crime rate. The voters are delighted. June 2020 polls — the latest available — showed his approval ratings at 70 percent.

But Duterte’s national popularity hasn’t deterred the

ICC’S chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, from her pursuit of him for “crimes against humanity, torture, and other inhumane acts committed in connection with the president’s

war on drugs.” Gambian-born Bensouda started her investigation in February 2018. One month later Duterte announced that the Philippines was withdrawing from the jurisdiction of the ICC, although the withdrawal did not officially take effect until a year later.

This will be one of the first hurdles that the court will have to overcome in its efforts to bring Duterte to justice. The president’s office argues that the court no longer has the right to investigate or prosecute alleged crimes of Philippine citizens. The ICC disagrees. it says its mandate still runs in the case because the crimes being investigated started in 2011 — nine years before the Philippines’ official departure from its jurisdiction. In this position, the ICC has the support of a recent ruling of the Filipino Supreme Court.

But for any ICC investigation

to be successful it needs cooperation from the government. Presidential spokesman Harry Roque has said that no government official will cooperate in any way whatsoever with the ICC. Duterte has refused to speak with them.

Of course, if there is a different administration in Manila after June 2022, that could change. But at the moment it looks as if Duterte’s most likely successor is his daughter.

There is also the complication that Bensouda is about to retire as chief prosecutor. That is why she has given a deadline of Aug. 13 for families affected by Duterte’s death squads to supply evidence to the prosecutor’s office. While she has been a driving force in going after Duterte, her replacement — British barrister Karim Khan — appears keen to pick up the cudgels.

It is clear, though, that Duterte will not be dragged off to

The Hague the moment he leaves the presidential palace in June next year. The ICC prosecutor’s office believes it has all the evidence it needs to mount a case, but Duterte — and possibly the administration that succeeds him — will use every legal maneuver available to block the court and keep him in the country.

ICC Prosecutors have made it clear, however, that extrajudicial killings are illegal regardless of who sanctioned them and that the person responsible should be brought to justice in order to re-establish the rule of law. So strong is their belief that prosecutors have spoken about a trial taking place even if Duterte dies before he can be dragged to the dock.