“When people celebrate EDSA every February, I often wonder: What is there to celebrate?”
IT IS now clear that as far as the prosecutor of the ICC (International Criminal Court) is concerned, former President Rodrigo Duterte has to answer and be responsible for the many extra-judicial killings recorded during his years of presidency where he launched that brutal and bloody war against illegal drugs.
According to official estimates, over 6,000 were killed, but according to unofficial estimates, about somewhere between 26,000 and 28,000 were killed.
This is now the outcome of the ICC insofar as the former president is concerned, that he has to be held responsible for all the killings including EJKs.
The defense lies mostly on the fact that he did not do the killings, in spite of his threats to kill all those involved in illegal drugs.
The illegal drugs menace in the country remains and Duterte is now accused of crimes against humanity by the ICC.
In fact he has been under detention in the Hague, the headquarters of the ICC.
How can Duterte not be responsible for launching what was called “Oplan Tokhang” where police would just knock on the door of suspected drug dealers who were mostly young people who were drugtakers and to finance their habit had to deal in illegal drugs?
In fact there are co-conspirators included in the prosecution against Duterte, principally the head of the PNP (Philippine National Police), former police chief Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa who is now a senator.
Under de la Rosa, the administration of Duterte launched the much dreaded Tokhang campaign. After that campaign came the also much dreaded “Operation Double Barrel”, also implemented by Bato dela Rosa.
Aside from the brutal and bloody campaign of Duterte against illegal drugs when he was president, there was also that similar episode when he was mayor of Davao City with the infamous Davao Death Squad where the DDS targeted suspected criminals of Davao and had them killed.
Who else could have ordered that killing if not the mayor of Davao City who then was Rodrigo Duterte. He cannot deny all those speeches wherein he threatened to kill anybody dealing in drugs.
As I said, the trial of Duterte is almost at an end and all the relatives of the victims of that brutal and bloody war on illegal drugs now lie on the doorstep of Duterte and he must be held responsible for them.
It cannot be said that the police killed people just because they were fighting back.
How can you fight back the police? That’s the only defense on the side of Duterte.
I am not predicting at this point what will happen. All that I am saying is it’s about time Duterte and those involved in the killings must be held responsible because those days were dark pages in Philippine history and whoever was responsible should be made responsible for them.
The EDSA Concoction
I call it an EDSA Concoction because we just celebrated 40 years of the story concocted by the anti-Marcos people after the assumption of Corazon Aquino as president of the country.
It has been 40 years of EDSA which was concocted to be called EDSA 40 People Power Revolution.
This is what happened. After President Ferdinand Marcos Sr. left Malacanang the night before and with Cory being sworn in as the new president, a little more than 500,000 gathered at EDSA in what was romantically called the EDSA People Power Revolution.
Actually, it is a misnomer — it was not a real revolution. It was just a change of regime.
The “Yellows” should stop making something of it every year.
Cory Aquino is not the icon of democracy since she was just the beneficiary of EDSA.
When people celebrate EDSA every February, I often wonder: What is there to celebrate?
