Author's Notes: This is the first half of Chapter 4. It needs more editing and refinement, but it nevertheless establishes the interesting parts of the first information that has been submitted to the ICC.
CHAPTER 4 ON TO THE ICC
“In any case, frequent punishments are a sign of weakness or slackness in the government. There is no man so bad that he cannot be made good for something. No man should be put to death, even as an example, if he can be left to live without danger to society. - Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “The Social Contract”
“It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.” ― Voltaire
BY the last quarter of 2016, the Magdalo Party List of Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV and Rep. Gary Alejano, and their legislative staffs worked overtime to find legal ways to stop Rodrigo Duterte from his deadly track to kill with impunity the people they suspect of involvement in illegal drug trade and use and impose his despicable brand of authoritarianism. The Magdalo Party List went into full mobilization. On the one hand, Trillanes took charge of the buildup of crimes against humanity charges against Duterte. It was to be submitted to the International Criminal Court (ICC). On the other hand, Alejano worked doubly hard on the impeachment complaint against Duterte. Against all odds, the Magdalo group perceived the twin moves – ICC charges and impeachment complaint - as complementary to each other. While the Trillanes’s crimes against humanity charges could be long-term, Alejano’s impeachment complaint was short-term. Alejano filed it first before Congress but it did not take off to become a victim of vicious political play by the coalition of political forces supporting Duterte. The coalition in power killed it outright.1
Trillanes’s colleagues and legislative staff took a punishing grind to solidify the crimes against humanity charges against Duterte and his cohorts. They did extensive research – topic by topic, provision by provision, and page by page, and word for word - to examine every available literature on the planned crimes against humanity charges against Duterte and his ilk. They focused their efforts on the provisions of the Rome Statute, the multilateral treaty creating the ICC in 2003. They had to determine the requirements for legal compliance on the planned charges, particularly the issues of jurisdiction, admissibility, and complementarity. This move sought to ensure the ICC would welcome the charges. Their efforts paid off, as his group, showing utmost devotion, professionalism, and esprit de corps, had built up a case against Duterte and his ilk. They burned the proverbial midnight oil to come out for the first time with charges of international dimension against an incumbent president. Trillanes and his group knew they were facing an unpredictable opponent in Duterte, whom they believed had a criminal mind. Besides, they felt that any charges against Duterte before the ICC could prosper because Duterte’s influence could not reach the ICC.
It was not true that somebody else did the case buildup for the intrepid lawmaker. Credit goes to his legislative staff and the Magdalo Party. The truth was that they built the case with tacit encouragement from the democratic political opposition. The case buildup was carried secretly and it did not leak to the Palace. One of the lawyers, who worked feverishly on the case buildup was Reynaldo B. Robles, a volunteer lawyer since court cases were filed against the Magdalo leaders in 2004. Robles, whose training is in corporate law, used to represent Trillanes in his court cases related to the Oakwood Mutiny.2 The arrival of lawyer Jude Josue Sabio in Manila on October 5, 2016 from Cagayan de Oro City completed the cast of lawyers and researchers, who worked feverishly on the crimes against humanity charges for submission to the ICC. But Sabio had to represent first Edgar Matobato, the self-confessed assassin of the dreaded Davao Death Squad (DDS), before the right forum. Matobato appeared at the Senate, which conducted, albeit half-heartedly, a probe “in aid of legislation” of the reported extrajudicial killings (EJKs) in the country. Then Sen. Richard Gordon, who was then a key Duterte ally, chaired the proceedings of the Senate inquiry on the EJKs.3
The inquiry, initiated first by then Sen. Leila de Lima in her capacity as the chair of the Senate committee on justice and human rights, went to determine the EJKs’ extent since Duterte took his oath. Sensing that the inquiry would put not just Duterte but his entire government on the bad light, the fawning Gordon, with help from defeated vice presidential candidate Alan Peter Cayetano, who retained his Senate seat though, highjacked the inquiry by kicking de Lima out as the committee chair. The inquiry in Gordon’s hand zigged and zagged off its mandate to end up exonerating any complicity and responsibility on the part of Duterte and his minions. Gordon even went to the extent to besmirch the reputation of the guilt-ridden Matobato, who chose to turn his back on the DDS and reveal everything he knew about the group, his former handlers, and Duterte. He called him “damaged goods.”4 It did not make sense for Gordon to side with Duterte’s war on drugs because he is the concurrent chair of the Philippine Red Cross (PRC), a nongovernment organization tasked to save and preserve lives in times of calamities and disasters, which have become commonplace in the disaster-prone Philippines. The PRC’s goal to save lives and Duterte's war on drugs are essentially in conflict.
NATIONAL CONSCIOUSNESS. Edgar Matobato, a functionally illiterate self-confessed DDS gunman, has developed traction in the national consciousness, when he emerged in two consecutive weekly public hearings of the Senate inquiry on September 15 and 22, 2016 to reveal publicly the existence of the DDS as an armed group, which Duterte formed way back in 1988, when he was first elected mayor of Davao City. Matobato earlier claimed he was under Duterte’s employ to eliminate people, who were believed to engage in criminal activity. According to Matobato, Duterte “led, directed, and participated in killing a number of people,” when he was mayor of Davao City. Although he claimed to have been part of the dreaded DDS, Matobato said he later turned his back on them and claimed to have become disgusted with its ways, especially when the hit squad graduated to kill personal enemies of the Dutertes – father Rodrigo and son Paolo.5
Matobato was not the only person to have come out to claim direct participation in the DDS and reveal killing people under Duterte’s order. Shortly after his retirement in 2017, Police Officer Arthur Lascanas revealed publicly that he too worked as a DDS member and issued an affidavit to reveal Duterte’s participation in the hit squad. Lascanas appeared in the Senate inquiry on Oct. 3, 2016, but denied, at first, Matobato’s allegations about the DDS. Four months later, he said he was forced to lie because he wanted to secure his family first from any reprisal by Duterte and his minions, if ever he would speak the truth. On February 19, 2017, Lascanas, in a sudden turnaround, issued a damaging affidavit against Duterte. Lascanas held a press conference to make public his affidavit and corroborate what Matobato earlier said in the Sept. 15 and Sept. 22, 2016 Senate public hearings. Immediately after the press conference, Lascanas, who claimed that his two brothers were killed by the DDS because of their alleged involvement in drugs, disappeared from the public view and reportedly went underground.
The inevitable happened. The testimonies of Matobato and Lascanas were regarded not only revealing but damaging as well by the senators allied with Duterte. Gordon led the pro-Duterte faction of lawmakers to derail the proceedings but not without Gordon’s committee (and his leadership), earning the unpalatable tag of “comite de absuelto” (acquittal committee) from Trillanes.6 The Lascanas-Matobato tandem had provided the one-two punch that confirmed DDS’s official existence as a killing machine in Davao City. They were the insiders, who gave details on the extent of its operations. Their public confessions were part of the opening portion of the information, which the Magdalo, through lawyer Jude Josue Sabio, submitted to the ICC on April 17, 2017.
As originally planned, Trillanes completed the information for submission to the ICC. What his Magdalo colleagues and legislative staff had prepared was reinforced by inputs by the latecoming Jude Josue Sabio, who was hired and paid as the professional lawyer to represent not only Lascanas and Matobato, but the Magdalo as well. The information Sabio submitted to the ICC was the first to have come from the Philippines since the ICC’s existence in 2003. It contained allegation of crimes against humanity against Rodrigo Duterte and 11 henchmen, who allegedly participated in the bloody but failed antidrug war. The information aptly pointed to “mass murder” as the focal point of the charges of crimes against humanity against Duterte and his henchmen.
Moreover, it narrated that the mass murder was not just mere random acts of violence against certain persons, but a state policy (or” state-sponsored’) led and directed by Duterte himself. Aside from Duterte, the information included then Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre; then Philippine National Police Director General Ronald dela Rosa (now a senator); then House of Representatives Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez; and then Interior Secretary Ismael Sueno. It also included then Solicitor General Jose Calida, then Senators Richard Gordon and Alan Peter Cayetano, Police Superintendent Edilberto Leonardo, Senior Police Officer 4 Sanson "Sonny" Buenaventura, Police Superintendent Royina Garma (who later became head of the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office), and then National Bureau of Investigation Director Dante Gierran (who later became head of PhilHealth).
FIRST INFORMATION. The information submitted to the ICC Office of the Prosecutor had claimed that Rodrigo Duterte, as mayor of Davao City, and, later, as president of the Philippines, was engaged in the mass murder of people suspected to have been involved in the use and trade of prohibited drugs. Amplifying its allegations of mass murder, the information said:
“All in all, the ‘repeated, unchanging and continuous’ mass murder being conducted by the President Duterte has already resulted into the deaths of not less than 1,400 individuals in Davao City under his Davao Death Squad and not less than 7,000 individuals in his war on drugs at the national level. In the ultimate analysis, this communication will present a situation for the determination and finding by the International Criminal Court of individual criminal liability or responsibility on the part of Mayor and President Duterte over the continuing commission of mass murder ever since he was the Mayor of Davao City up to the time that he became the President of the Philippines in his war on drugs at the national level.”
The information claimed that, for the interest of international criminal justice, the ICC, through its Office of the Prosecutor, should proceed to conduct a preliminary investigation on the reported mass murder on the basis of the facts laid down by this information and details given by international human rights groups like Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International. It raised the possibility to bring the issue to the next step after preliminary investigation, which is the formal investigation by the ICC. The first information said:
“This communication will further demonstrate why there is sufficient factual and legal basis for the Office of the Prosecutor to take the following course of action, namely; (1) to CONFIRM with the Pre-Trial Chamber the proper criminal charges for crimes against humanity against President Duterte and his senior administration officials; (2) to APPLY with the Pre-Trial Chamber for the issuance of a Warrant of Arrest against President Duterte and his concerned senior administration officials for his arrest, surrender and detention pending trial at the Detention Facility at the Hague of the International Criminal Court, in order to prevent them from continuing with the commission of mass murder and to prevent them from killing potential victims and witnesses, and (3) to PURSUE with the Pre-Trial Chamber the commitment of President Duterte and his concerned senior administration officials to the Trial Chamber for appropriate trial, and for a conviction and sentence to a prison term or life imprisonment.”
Dwelling on mass murder in the form of extrajudicial killings (EJKs), the information said than 7,000 incidents of drug-related killings took place from July 1, 2016 to January 21, 2017 allegedly perpetrated by police officers and unidentified groups under the direction of President Rodrigo Duterte. According to the information, the mass murder was a continuation on national scale of what had the DDS started when he was mayor of Davao City. It said:
“Based on the testimony of Matobato and Lascañas, it is now established by direct firsthand account that President Duterte is the mastermind and leader of the Davao Death Squad, when he was still the Mayor of Davao City. If it is the best indication, President Duterte happens to be that same leader and mastermind of the Davao Death Squad who is now the President of the Philippines waging, encouraging and promoting the so-called war on drugs at the national level.“
Duterte had followed the template, which he had developed and implemented, when he became mayor of Davao City in 1988. Hence, Duterte had implemented the same Davao City template on the national level. The information continued:
“In a public speech, President Duterte boasted as Mayor that his ‘best practice’ in eradicating or controlling crime in Davao is to kill suspected criminals, asserting it to be his secret in making his claim that Davao City the ninth safest city in the world. Based on his public pronouncements when he was still vying for President, Mayor Duterte manifested a clear intention to CONTINUE with his ‘best practice,’ strategy or system in Davao City when he made the eradication of the drug menace as a centerpiece of his campaign platform for the presidency. In fact, his campaign promise underlined by his serious threats in public TO KILL drug addicts and pushers made him so popular that he won by 16 million votes, all the more compelling and pressuring him to continue his ‘best practice,’ strategy or system in the Davao Death Squad in order to fulfill his campaign promise.
“It is, thus, humbly submitted that when Mayor Duterte was elected and assumed office as President of the Philippines, he intended to continue and in fact did continue, by way of a model or template, the ‘best practice’ strategy or system implemented by him in Davao City through the Davao Death Squad when he was still the Mayor and, in furtherance of such intent to continue, he expanded its coverage, as President, to the national level in order to implement his campaign promise to eradicate the drug problem in six months.”
The information contained details about what it described as “basic material hallmarks or elements in the extrajudicial executions” by DDS groups in Davao City and the extrajudicial executions after Duterte had assumed the presidency. They include: the element of police participation and command; the element of a hitman or an unknown armed assailant; the presence of a reward system for every killing; and the provision of reward in cash. Other details: the adherence to a kill watch list; the collaboration between barangay and police officials; the presence of the cardboard sign and the face/body wrapped in packing tape (or duct tape); the use of “riding in tandem” motorcycle-riding assailants; the use of hooded or masked assailants; and the planting of guns and drugs. The information said:
“The public pronouncements of President Duterte after the President express a loud and clear intention to promote, encourage, or incite the police and civilians to mass murder or violence, thereby betraying the self-same mental state indicating an awareness, knowledge or intent to further continue at the national level, in an unrelenting fashion and with the same impunity, what he considers to be the ‘best practice,’ strategy or system of killing suspected criminals through the Davao Death Squad when he was still the Mayor of Davao City.”
The information noted that Duterte never condemned the spate of mass killings but even took pride that its increased number showed that his war on drugs was a “success.” He conveyed his weird and distorted sense of value that the sudden increase in instances of mass murder was an accomplishment, an achievement in governance. It added:
“In sum, the following propositions are humbly submitted before the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, namely: (1) as a Mayor of Davao City, Rodrigo Duterte already committed CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY through the mass murder or extrajudicial executions under his Davao Death Squad of suspected criminals carried out as a ‘best practice,’ strategy or system for crime control, and (2) as the President on and after 30 June 2016, he merely intended to continue and did continue the commission of CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY also carried out under the same ‘best practice’ strategy or system of extrajudicial or summary executions in Davao City, this time in his war on drugs at the national level. In other words, President Duterte, as a Mayor and later as a President, has been ‘repeatedly, unchangingly and continuously’ committing crimes against humanity through mass murder since the time that he was the Mayor of Davao City up to the time when he immediately became the President of the Philippines in his war on drugs at the national level.”
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CONSPIRACY
THE first information submitted to the ICC led with allegations about what could be regarded as a conspiracy in the Duterte government to hide and distort the real score on the war on drugs. It narrated the conspiracy in the two chambers of Congress and Duterte and his minions to dissipate the momentum created by the appearance of Edgar Matobato and Arturo Lascanas in the Senate. It described the conspiracy to jail Sen. Leila de Lima on trumped up charges that she was responsible for the proliferation of illegal drugs in the Muntinlupa National Prison. Sen. Richard Gordon, as the newly installed chair of the Senate committee on human rights and justice, cockily refused to allow Matobato to re-appear in the third committee hearing and went to the extent of making a premature conclusion that Matobato was “damaged goods” to justify his refusal. It was claimed that they conspired to weaken the damage created by the revelations of Matobato and Lascanas and these included efforts to end their testimonies before the Senate.
On the contrary, Lascanas, according to the information, made a public confession in the February 20, 2017 press conference at the Senate premises confirming Matobato’s earlier statement “that he was a long-time leader of the dreaded Davao Death Squad, who has been involved in the killing of around 300 persons, upon the order and behest of former Mayor, now Pres. Rodrigo Duterte.” It said that Trillanes took efforts to have Lascanas’s confession to be investigated by the Senate committee on public order and dangerous drugs, chaired by Sen. Panfilo Lacson. But it led to the Senate reorganization, where the senators, who supported Trillanes’s motion were booted out of their committee chairmanships. It sought to marginalize Duterte’s critics in the Senate and to make it almost impossible to seek local remedies on the spate of EJKs. It said:
“Based on the testimony of Matobato and Lascañas, it is now established by direct firsthand account that President Duterte is the mastermind and leader of the Davao Death Squad when he was still the Mayor of Davao City. If it is the best indication, President Duterte happens to be that same leader and mastermind of the Davao Death Squad who is now the President of the Philippines, waging, encouraging, and promoting the so-called war on drugs at the national level…
“The situation in the Philippines reveals a terrifying, gruesome and disastrous continuing commission of extra-judicial executions or mass murder from the time President Duterte was the Mayor of Davao City through his Davao Death Squad up to the time that he became the President after 30 June 2016 in his war on drugs at the national level.”
According to the information, Duterte elevated his strategy of killing drug suspects into “best practice.” It said:
“Mayor Duterte was elected and assumed office as President of the Philippines, he intended to continue and in fact did continue, by way of a model or template, the ‘best practice,’ strategy or system implemented by him in Davao City through the Davao Death Squad when he was still the Mayor and, in furtherance of such intent to continue, he expanded its coverage, as President, to the national level in order to implement his campaign promise to eradicate the drug problem in six months…
“President Duterte’s continuation at the national level of the ‘best practice’ strategy or system of crime control implemented by him previously through the Davao Death Squad in Davao City when he was still the Mayor, which is to ‘erase,’ eliminate or kill suspected criminals, is further proven by the same basic elements or hallmarks extant in the extrajudicial executions of drug pushers and users in his so-called war on drugs at the national level. A central and defining element of the ‘best practice,’ strategy or system is, of course, no other than President Duterte himself, what with his criminal character and mindset.“
The 78-page information discussed the “basic material hallmarks or elements” in the summary executions committed by the DDS elements in Davao City and the spate of EJKs when Duterte became the president. They were “too numerous and too obvious to escape scant attention,” it said. This was not the end, according to the information. It acknowledged the police complicity by falsifying police reports to hide the gruesome nature of EJKs. It said:
“The police are falsifying police spot reports and planting evidence to make it appear that drug personalities fought back and had to be killed as a matter of self-defense. The police will always rely on the falsified reports of their colleagues by according to such reports the presumption of regularity in the performance of official duty, as previously asserted in public by no less than Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre. Also, the police will stand by their falsified official version that the drug personality fought back and opened fire justifying self-defense on the part of the police operative, even if witnesses’ account clearly contradicts the police version. President Duterte has pronounced that he will stand by the police no matter what. Relatives and families of victims are afraid to come out due to police reprisal. The fear of reprisal coupled with the pressure the police will bear on the potential victims or their families makes any investigation virtually impossible.”
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JURISDICTIONAL REQUIREMENT
THE first information, researched and developed by the legislative staff of Trillanes and Alejano and their Magdalo colleagues and filed by Jude Josue Sabio, who injected the legal viewpoint and legalese, made clear its intent and spirit. Incidentally, a complaint lodged before the ICC is dubbed as “information.” This is to de-emphasize the complaint aspect. The ICC reserves its right to act or ignore the information on the basis of its Rome Statute, its charter. For reason of precision, the complete quote of the information:
“In this communication, what is being sought to be brought to the subject matter jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court are the crimes against humanity through extra-judicial or summary executions constituting mass murder ‘repeatedly, unchangingly and continuously’ being committed and undertaken by President Duterte when he was still the Mayor of Davao City through his Davao Death Squad and later when he became the President of the Philippines on and after 30 June 2016. This ‘repeated, unchanging and continuous’ commission of mass murder carried out as part of a systematic or widespread attack against a civilian population falls within the definition of a crime against humanity through murder pursuant to the Elements of Crime set out by the Assembly of States Parties, and as provided for under Article 5, Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. Clearly, this continuing commission of mass murder constituting a crime against humanity falls within the subject matter jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court.”
The information clarified the scope of its complaint. Even Duterte committed crimes against humanity when he was Davao City mayor since 1988, “only those acts of mass murder carried out or undertaken after August 2011, which is the time that the Philippines became a state party to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, are being submitted to the temporal jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court.” It has made clear that “Rodrigo Duterte, the one being charged in the information, is a national and resident of the Philippines, which is a state party to the Rome Statute, clearly falls within the personal jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court.” Moreover, the Duterte’s co-defendants are “nationals and residents of the Philippines and fall within the personal jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court.”
The information acknowledged and affirmed that the war on drugs was Duterte’s centerpiece program during the political campaign in 2016, but said he never condemned the impunity associated with what the information described a “virulent and brutal national campaign against illegal drugs,” which he himself had launched immediately after he was sworn in as president. On the contrary, Duterte claimed publicly that his war on drugs was a “success” on the basis of the number of the thousands of persons who were killed. Critics claimed killing a huge number of people could never be a success. His weird sense of success was noticeable to the point of absurdity. On the contrary, the information noticed the increasing crescendo of the criticisms against his bloody government and it said:
“President Duterte has been continuously and without let-up lashing out at his critics with profanity-laced utterances. Never at any instance has it been recorded that President Duterte ever condemned the 7,000 to 8,000 drug related killings, citing it instead as proof of the success of his war on drugs. Neither has he taken direct action by issuing any proclamation or executive order for his administrative agencies in his executive department to bring to criminal justice persons responsible – and that includes himself - for crimes against humanity which are precisely the subject matter being brought before the International Criminal Court through this communication. Instead of condemning the thousands of extra-judicial executions and bringing to criminal justice the perpetrators thereof, including himself, he even incited the police and civilians to mass violence and recently vowed to continue his war on drugs or the mass murder up to the end of his six-year presidential term.“
To stress the failure of state agencies to run after the perpetrators of the EJKs associated with Duterte’s war on drugs, the information said:
“Consequently, at the national level, national investigation agencies in the Duterte government like the Department of Justice, particularly its National Bureau of Investigation, and the Philippine National Police, have not launched nor conducted any national investigation into the kind of situation that is being brought before the International Criminal Court through this communication. More particularly, these investigatory agencies supposed to be mandated to conduct investigations into reported incidents of crime have not opened, much less conducted, any probe or investigation dealing specifically with the potential criminal responsibility or liability of President Duterte and his senior officials of his administration, in the historical context of the Davao Death Squad, over the continuing commission of mass murder or extrajudicial executions before in Davao City under this Davao Death Squad and later in his war on drugs at the national level carried out as part of a systematic or widespread attack directed against a civilian population.”
The information justified the charges against humanity charges against Duterte and his ilk, saying the state agencies would not do anything to incriminate themselves. It said:
“The hard political reality in the Philippines is that President Duterte will never open, much less pursue, an investigation in his executive department into his very own criminal liability as a death squad Mayor and President as well as that of his senior officials in his government, specifically in relation to crimes against humanity in the actual historical context of his Davao Death Squad in Davao City when he was still the Mayor. Just like what happened in Davao City when he was the Mayor, he will never order the investigative agencies under him like the Department of Justice, the National Bureau of Investigation and the Philippine National Police to conduct such kind of investigation. Based on his repeated public pronouncements, President Duterte has even incited, promoted and encouraged policemen to kill drug personalities and assured them of protection if brought to prosecution or of pardon and reinstatement to the police service, with rank promotion, if convicted. Despite strong criticisms from the international community, from the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines, heads of States, the United Nations personnel, the reports of the Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, still President Duterte has not bothered at all to conduct or to order the conduct of an investigation, specifically in the context of his Davao Death Squad relating to his specific criminal liability and responsibility over the continuing commission of extra-judicial executions in his war on drugs at the national level.“
It continued with the lengthy potshot:
“Even if there were investigations into the extra-judicial executions in the war on drugs, such investigations would be futile, because President Duterte has promised to support any policeman charged in court for following presidential orders to carry out the war on drugs. A case in point is that of PNP Supt. Marvin Marcos, and his men, who have been found guilty by both the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) and the Senate Committee on Justice and Human Rights. Against the Rules of Court, police procedures and even logic, Marcos served a warrant of arrest to Albuera Mayor Espinosa, before dawn, and inside the jail cell where Espinosa was being detained after surrendering to the police. Espinosa was shot dead in what Marcos claimed was a firefight, but what investigators said was cold-blooded murder. When asked to comment about the Senate findings that Marcos was guilty of murder, President Duterte promised to support Marcos because, he said, the police were his men and so he had to support them. In later speeches, President Duterte also promised to pardon them, should they be convicted in a local court, and to promote them after. In this situation, how can the Executive branch of the Duterte government, which is tasked with both the investigation and the prosecution of the killings, investigate itself? How can the executive branch carry out a genuine investigation when President Duterte himself continues to publicly support the police version, in the face of contrary evidence and findings?”
It added:
“In the Rome Statute, one of the conditions used to determine inability to investigate a particular case is the total or substantial collapse or unavailability of a country’s national judicial system. The Philippine judicial system, which is independent from the executive, is functioning. But the judgment of its courts is dependent on the investigations carried out by the Executive, and its courts cannot conduct a genuine trial without an impartial investigation by the police. Further, the decisions of the courts are subject to presidential pardon: the courts may convict but the president may pardon, as President Duterte has promised, again and again, to those who carry out his orders to kill. Justice will still not be served, if the President will pardon those whom the courts convict of these crimes. Any investigation and trial, therefore, must involve President Duterte and his criminal liability and responsibility as the mastermind and leader of the Davao Death Squad in Davao City and in the continuing mass murder in the war on drugs at the national level.”
The information did not fail to mention the web of friendship and interrelationships among the current people in the Duterte government, saying these personal relationships could spell disaster to any future investigations. The Filipino culture, where personal relationship is given emphasis, has always been the weakness that could lead to any objective, impartial, and independent probe of any given issue. It said:
“The composition of the current Duterte administration makes it doubly impossible for an investigation by the Duterte government into the criminal liability of President Duterte as a President over the continuing extrajudicial executions in the war on drugs in the factual context of the Davao Death Squad when he was still the Mayor of Davao City. Atty. Vitaliano Aguirre, who is the Secretary of Justice, is a law school classmate and fraternity brother of President Duterte. He also served at one time as the lawyer for Senior Police Officer 4 Bienvenido Laud in the Avasola case. Atty. Salvador Medialdea, who is Executive Secretary or the so-called ‘Little President,’ is close to the President, due to their long-standing friendship dating back to their fathers and served also as counsel in the Avasola case for PSO4 Bienvenido Laud, a known leading member of the Davao Death Squad. Atty. Dante Gierran, who is the Director of the National Bureau of Investigation, was part of the group that fed a live individual tagged as a kidnapper to a crocodile in Digos City, a city in southern Mindanao. Atty. Salvador Panelo, the Presidential Legal Counsel, had also served as lawyer for President Duterte and was counsel for the Ampatuans in the so-called Maguindanao Massacre. Atty. Jose Calilda, who is Solicitor General, also served as a chief assistant in Davao City when Duterte was still Mayor. Last but not the least is Philippine National Police Chief Ronaldo de la Rosa who heads the Philippine National Police and was once the Chief of the City Police of Davao City when Duterte was still Mayor. He was one of those tagged by Edgar Matobato and Arthur Lascañas in certain criminal incidents involving the Davao Death Squad.
“All these President’s men who are holding senior key positions in the Duterte government and who have the legal mandate to conduct investigations cannot and will not anymore be expected to conduct such kind of investigation. The reason is so simple to see. As alter egos and trusted men of President Duterte, they are not in a position to contradict the actuations and pronouncements of President Duterte. As a matter of fact, except for Atty. Medialdea and Atty. Gierran who have kept mum, all the rest have announced in public their full support for the President Duterte’s war on drugs and defended the extra-judicial or summary executions as part of legitimate police drug operations. As a result, there has been no investigation into the kind of situation that is being brought before the International Criminal Court through this communication.”
The conclusion:
“Undeniably, if there is to be any investigation undertaken or to be undertaken into the specific situation sought through this communication to be brought to the International Criminal Court or in connection with any matter relevant to such specific situation, there can be no meaningful and genuine investigation at all. This is simply because the Duterte government is unwilling or unable to do so on account of the fact that President Duterte is himself criminally involved and liable in the context of the Davao Death Squad ever since he was the Mayor of Davao City. If it is any indication, during the time that he was the Mayor of Davao City, President Duterte never even lifted a finger to investigate the thousand killings undertaken under the Davao Death Squad. This is precisely because in hindsight he is personally involved. The same is perfectly true this time that he is now the President of the Philippines who, as such, will not open, much less allow, a national investigation into his own personal criminal liability or responsibility for the mass murder.”
The information said that the only investigation conducted about the spate of EJKs pursued by the Duterte government was done by the joint probe of the two Senate committees, but they could not be relied upon to punish the guilty parties because they were primarily “in aid of legislation.” They were intended essentially to look into the insufficiency and unsustainability of public policy and never to run after the guilty parties. Hence, the ICC has to step in and perform its mandate against leaders who pursue crimes against humanity against their people. It said:
“In other words, in technical legal terms, the Senate exercised its legislative power over a subject matter in aid of legislation which is not the same as the situation being brought before the International Criminal Court through this communication, which is the criminal liability or responsibility of President Duterte over the continuing mass murder committed ever since by him through his Davao Death Squad in Davao City and later in his war on drugs at the national level after he became the President.”
The punchline:
“The first Senate inquiry conducted by the Committee on Justice and Human Rights joint with the Committee on Public Order and Dangerous Drugs originally began with the aim only of looking into and investigating the spate of the extra-judicial executions in the war on drugs after 30 June 2016; or to be sure, it was not intended to investigate, look into or determine the criminal liability or responsibility of President Duterte. It was only later with the testimony of Edgar Matobato that the inquiry began to veer towards the Davao Death Squad and the personal involvement of President Duterte in the Davao Death Squad and its willful killings in Davao City when he was still the Mayor. In fact, to serve as factual basis for the presentation of Edgar Matobato, Senator Antonio Trillanes IV had to, as he did, belatedly file a Resolution, consistent with the Senate rules, to include in the inquiry the matter involving the Davao Death Squad.56 This was followed later by the testimony of Arthur Lascañas in the Committee on Public Order and Dangerous Drugs, who confirmed the earlier testimony of Edgar Matobato by confirming the existence of the Davao Death Squad, its willful killings in Davao City and the personal involvement of President Duterte as the Mayor then.”
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FIRST INSIDERS
THE importance of civilian Edgar Matobato and Police Officer3 Arthur Lascanas in the probe of Duterte’s war on drugs is undeniable. They constitute the first insiders, who have emerged from the cold to provide firsthand information and valuable insights on the DDS operations. As insiders, they participated in the planning and implementation of the summary executions of persons, whom Duterte identified for murder. There were not mere lookouts, which stayed in the periphery of the crime scene. They were the actual assassins, who pulled the trigger to kill and execute victims in compliance with Duterte’s orders. Hence, their testimonies as insiders carry a lot of weight. They are firsthand information.
Edgar Matobato was born in 1959 in a community of forest rangers residing at the foot of Mt. Apo, the highest mountain in Mindanao. Because his family was poor, Matobato only reached first grade, which means he was functionally illiterate, as he could not read, write, and compute. Unidentified men killed his father, leading him to seek justice for his father. In his adult life, he worked first as a cook in Davao City and a member of the auxiliary Constabulary Home Defense Forces (CHDF). When his unit was disbanded, he was recruited to join as a “ghost employee” under Davao City’s civil security unit. But he was not a ghost employee, who received a salary every month, but a feared DDS assassin.
Matobato joined DDS in 1988 out of poverty and for gainful employment. As a ghost employee of the Davao City Government, he received a monthly salary of at least P5,000 ($100), but it was later raised to P7,000 ($130). For an uneducated man, the amount was big. Incidentally, the amount excluded the money, which he received for every successful act of abduction and murder operations. Matobato placed at about 50 persons, whom he personally killed in the course of his 24-year employment as a DDS killer. Except for the important targets, who were prominent in the southern port city, Matobato claimed he did not know the names of their victims, many of whom were petty criminals in Davao City.
According to Matobato, he initially killed petty criminals like thieves, drug addicts, and pushers, among others but he soon found himself engaged in the murder of people, who were identified as political enemies, including their associates, and critics and journalists. Matobato was quoted as saying that, at first, he thought he was doing something justified, which was getting rid of people considered criminals in Davao City. He realized he was on the wrong side, when he was asked to kidnap and kill people, who were political enemies of the Dutertes – father Rodrigo and son Paolo. He recounted how his group kidnapped and killed four bodyguards of a rival politician, the late Prospero Nograles. They dumped their bodies in the sea believing they were all dead, but two resurfaced to live and tell their stories. He was conscience-stricken when his group abducted, beat, raped, and killed three women, all suspects in illegal drug trade.
CHANGE OF HEART. He identified PO3 Arthur Lascanas as his handler. Lascanas reported directly to Duterte, who trusted him. They worked together in a number of operations, most of which Lascanas led and planned. Matobato claimed he did not see Duterte giving personal instructions on whom to murder, but he was made to understand that the orders were coursed through Lascanas. When Matobato first appeared in the Sept. 15 and 22, 2016 Senate public hearings, he made revelations, which Lascanas, under oath, negated when it was his turn to testify in the Oct. 3 public hearing, saying there was no basis on the existence of the Davao Death Squad. But nearly four months later, or on Feb. 19, 2017, PO3 Arthur Lascanas had a change of heart and issued an affidavit, revealing what he knew about the DDS. Lascanas corroborated Matobato’s claim. A day later, or on Feb. 20, 2017, Lascanas gave a press conference flanked by Sen. Antonio Trillanes and lawyers of the Free Legal Assistance Group (FLAG). By that time, Matobato was no longer alone, as Lascanas had joined him.
Matobato said he was involved in various facets of the DDS operations. According to him, the DDS most often abducted their victims and brought them to a quiet part of town, like a quarry, and killed them. They dismembered their bodies, throwing them to the sea or burying them. They doused oil on them to prevent them from smelling as they decomposed. For those bodies dumped at the sea, they hacked open their chest cavities and filled them with rocks and sand to ensure the corpses sank, he said. Most orders came mostly from Lascanas, although he knew Duterte himself gave the orders.
Although Duterte claimed he did not know him, Matobato said DDS members, including him, were summoned to his office in December, 1993, when St. Peter Cathedral was bombed by unknown assailants. Duterte, alleging that the bombing was perpetrated by “extremists” in the Muslim community, ordered them to avenge the Cathedral’s bombing that killed seven persons and injured dozens. Matobato claimed Duterte asked them to go to mosques and kill Muslims in reprisal for the terror attack, which they did after receiving a number of grenades from Duterte himself. Matobato claimed he worked with Lascanas on the reprisal.
In their operations, Matobato claimed DDS operatives carried an extra, cheap pistol to throw to their victims’ bodies to make it appear that shootouts took place. Almost all the police "buy bust" operations ended with the “shootout” storyline, as morning papers put on their front pages crime scene photographs that had handguns next to sprawling, bloody bodies. The “nanlaban” (he fought back) narrative, when victims were made to appear to have fought against law enforcers, was always around during his days at the DDS.
His change of heart came in 2013 when his group abducted, raped, and stabbed three women, all suspects in drug trade. Then, he decided it was time to distance from the group. One day in early 2014, his group abducted him and detained him. They pushed him to admit he committed the murder of a known businessman in Davao City. It was an accusation he refused to admit. The group freed him after his wife Joselita Abarquez and members of his extended family begged for his life. Since he knew the group would later kill him, he went from town to town to save his life and his family. Matobato has a wife and two children.
Six months since Duterte sworn as president, images of EKJsc were splashed on the front pages of many newspapers every morning. Their stories said vigilante justice or police operations, known as "buy busts," always ended in the death of the alleged dealers. Matobato said they bore the imprints of the crimes perpetrated by the DDS - faces bound in electrical duct tape, crude cardboard signs around the victims' necks, proclaiming their alleged crimes, and warning the people not to follow their alleged misdeeds. Matobato claimed he saw his former DDS colleagues in Metro Manila. He alleged they were in the metropolis to pursue Duterte’s bloody war on drugs. He did not identify them nor explain details of their operations in Metro Manila.
Matobato claimed he was not the only one who wanted out of the DDS. Other DDS operatives had tried to get out, but at least one former member was run over by a vehicle under suspicious circumstances shortly after he tried to escape. Although he wanted out, his DDS colleagues did not agree probably because he knew many details in their operations after 24 years. In 2014, he was charged with kidnapping and illegal possession of firearms to silence him. He confessed to wife Joselita his involvement in those murders and she has been supporting him. He and his family went into hiding. His wife, quite literate, has kept a journal of his involvement, including the names and circumstances of their deaths at the hands of the DDS.
Prior to Matobato’s emergence, a certain Ernesto Avasola , also an ex-DDS operative, testified in 2009 in a Manila court and, without media fanfare, asked for a search warrant to look for skeletal remains in the Laud property in relation to the Davao Death Squad. The Laud quarry was said to be a major dumping ground of slain bodies. It was no different from the Ma-a quarry, also in Davao City.
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PIVOTAL INTERVIEW
JOURNALIST Antonio Montalvan II once interviewed Matobato and this was published in the July 21, 2021 dispatch of VeraFiles, a social media publication and fact checker. Montalvan wrote that Matobato and Lascanas knew each other. According to Montalvan, Matobato did not only unmask the official existence of the Davao Death Squad, or DDS, but explain its operations and involvement of PO3 Arthur Lascanas. Saying that the private interview took place after Duterte won in 2016 and when Matobato was no longer in the Department of Justice’s Witness Protection Program, Montalvan explained Matobato described the “dominance” that Lascañas had possessed in the DDS hierarchy. When Montalvan asked the DDS assassin on who decided on the people whom they killed, Matobato said:
“From the mayor, the one who decides is Arturo Lascañas. This Lascañas was his right-hand man. He is the team leader of the DDS or the Davao Death Squad. That’s SPO3 Lascañas. Even the police colonels and RDs (regional directors) had to go through Lascañas, whom Duterte trusted. He decides who the station commanders are in each district in Davao city. If you don’t pass through him, you will never land a position.”
Asked if Duterte was behind the killings, Matobato charged:
“Yes, you cannot just kill anyone in Davao city without Duterte’s approval. Otherwise, you will be charged. Who would have a liking for killing without anyone acting to shoulder for you? If no one will shoulder for you, you will go to jail. Of course, we had Duterte’s confidence in Lascañas, and I was Lascañas’s bodyguard. I was always behind him. For example, if they met and ate together in a table, I was in the next table and I would hear their conversations.”
Asked if he saw and heard Duterte in his reported meet with Lascañas, Matobato said:
Yes, he would always put his arm around Lascañas and pat him on the shoulder to say, “Tur, without you Davao city will not be peaceful.”
I: That is really your personal knowledge?
M: Yes,
personal knowledge. Of all the police personnel in Davao city, he is considered
the most terror police.
I: Where is he now?
M: He is in
Heinous [Crime Unit of the Davao City Police]
According to Montalvan’s article, Lascanas testified on the Oct. 3, 2016 public hearing of the Senate inquiry against Matobato, whom he fiercely rebutted under Trillanes’s grilling. The article said Lascanas changed his mind and quoted him as saying:
“One week later, I had a change of heart and went to see a friend nun in Manila who used to be assigned in Davao. This was in 2016. I [told] the nun that I wanted to confess to a priest. At the end of that year, I went back to Manila on December 22, 2016 after I had retired. I confessed everything to a priest. It was a group confession. Nuns were present during my confession. It took us several days of sessions.”
On Feb. 20, 2017, Lascanas had what could be called a “coming-out” press conference, where in the presence of Trillanes and lawyers of the Free Legal Assistance Group (FLAG), he confirmed what Matobato was saying the truth about DDS existence. In the series of media interviews, Lascanas corroborated Matobato’s accounts. Lascañas claimed he was still in the kill reward payroll of Duterte until the first week of January, 2017. In an interview he had with the Philippines Daily Inquirer newspaper, Lascañas alleged the DDS had become a “monster” because its operatives were transformed into killers for hire. “It had developed its own political economy, running brisk business with death,” it said.
CONTRACT KILLING. In his Feb. 19, 2017 affidavit, both signed and notarized, Lascanas alleged he accepted the P3 million worth of contract from Duterte to kill Juan Pajadora Pala Jr., aka Jun Pala, a radio commentator, who was an avid supporter but turned fierce critic of Duterte. Jun Pala rose to prominence as the former spokesman of the Alsa Masa, the anti-communist vigilante group that ran after communist groups in the southern port city. According to his affidavit, Lascanas immediately formed his team of assassins after accepting the contract. He asked for mobilization funds from SP4 Sanson Buenaventura, another trusted guy who was instructed by Duterte to hire the assassin to kill Jun Pala, and Lascanas said he was given P500,000.
Lascanas said he recruited SPO1 Jim Tan of Sta. Ana Police Station, whom he described as “a new member of our group,” the Heinous Crime Group of the Davao City Police. Lascanas said his group accepted Tan because he maintained “players” from the Rebel Returnees Association (RRA). They were former communist hit men, who were described to have returned to “the fold of the law.” Tan accepted Lascanas’s offer and recruited hitmen - the Duhilag brothers. They were Valentin, Alan, and Roland, all surnamed Duhilag, from the Davao district of Mandug and another person nicknamed “Joy” of Bacaca Heights in Davao City. They attempted twice on Jun Pala’s life but they did not succeed.
After lying low for two months, Lascanas met Duterte by chance in the Gaisano Mall and the Davao City mayor asked him about the two botched attempts on Jun Pala. He claimed he did not say anything but to offer an apology. Buenaventura later met him, who introduced to him a certain Jerry Trocio, a former communist cadre, who worked as a police asset. Trocio was Pala’s part time security man and he agreed to be their intelligence man in Pala’s group for a “reward” of P350,000, if he could provide information that could lead to Pala’s death. Lascanas gave pertinent details in his affidavit about their operations to kill Jun Pala.
INSIDE INFORMATION. Jerry Trocio worked on the project, providing information on the established pattern of Jun Pala’s nighttime whereabouts and exact location. It was Trocio, Lascanas alleged, who gave them the information that Jun Pala regularly played card games in his neighbor’s house. Based on Trocio’s information, Lascanas’s group devised a plan to ambush him when he returned home after a card game. They executed the plan twice but failed. On the third attempt, they succeeded in killing him. Lascanas identified Tan and the Duhilag brothers to have conducted the armed assault.
According to Lascanas, Buenaventura called up and gave him P3 million from Duterte, of which P1 million was divided into P500,000 each for him and Buenaventura; another P1 million to be shared by him, Buenaventura, and Trocio, while Tan kept the remainder of P1 million as share for him and his hitmen. Lascanas claimed that after a month, Duterte gave him a call, asking him to proceed to the house of his unidentified girlfriend in Davao City. Duterte gave him a “bonus” of P1 million. In his affidavit, Lascanas gave Duterte’s code name: “Superman.”
His affidavit said:
“The Davao City Police Office, the CIDG XI, and our unit the Heinous Crime Group, which I and Jim Tan were assigned, conducted an intense investigation regarding the ambushed killing of broadcaster Jun Pala. The Result: Unsolved.
“Today’s Jun Pala’s death can be considered SOLVED. Jun Pala was murdered by us at the instance and behest of then Mayor Rodrigo Duterte for three million pesos (P3,000,000.)”
The Lascanas’s 12-page affidavit contained not just Jun Pala’s murder but important details on the emergence of the DDS in Davao City. Lascanas alleged he was present when Duterte ordered the murder of a number of men and women, claiming he gave killers “reward money” after they killed them. “I was responsible for the killing of many men and women and, at least one child, upon the instructions of Mayor Duterte,” he said. The DDS originated when Duterte was elected mayor of Davao City in 1988 and Duterte organized the Anti-Crime Task Force. He assigned a certain Major Ernesto Macasaet, his “very close friend” as its head. It was about this time that Duterte started to form liquidation squads, later known as Davao Death Squad, or DDS.
RISE OF DDS. Although Lascanas claimed he was already a member of Duterte’s liquidation squad, their group was not yet known as DDS. It originated in police operations against Alan Tancio, a purported drug pusher. In the police operations against Tancio, Major Ildefonso Asentista and Cris Lanay, a rebel returnee, came out with the idea of putting the words “Davao Death Squad” on a note they left at Tancio’s house. Lascanas recounted it spread like wild fire. “DDS became a household name in Davao City,” he said. His affidavit contained details of operations, which Duterte’s liquidation squad did. These included the 1993 bombing of Davao mosques in retaliation to the bombing of St. Peter Cathedral reportedly by “extremists” in the Muslim community.
Lascanas’s first affidavit contained interesting details that showed his deep involvement in the DDS, particularly the summary executions of many elements in the port city. The murder of the family of a certain Pasajata, or Pajasata, a suspected leader of a kidnap for ransom gang, was a case in point. Intercepted by DDS operatives in Gen. Santos City, Pasajata and his family were brought to Davao City, where they were murdered upon Duterte’s order. This act of collective murder did not spare his four-year old son. His affidavit revealed the summary execution of rogue ex-Constabulary personnel named Jun Bersabal, who led former soldiers in criminal activity. Although notorious and had an arrest warrant, Bersabal was executed and his body was brought to Compostela Valley for disposal.
Since Duterte took over the presidency in 2016, mass media has carried many news and feature articles about his killing ways. Lascañas explained that killings were reported as homicides under investigation (HUI) by the Davao Police, in the same way drug deaths are now being accounted for under the Duterte administration. But he alleged that Davao Police gave “brisk business” to funeral parlors, which gave commissions to police officers, who facilitated use of their funeral facilities even if the victims were listed in the police blotters as “unknowns.” This was a situation, which had resemblance with killing operations in Metro Manila, where funeral parlors were said to have connived with police involved in the killings.
Arturo Baririquit Lascanas, 61, was a police officer throughout his almost 40 years of his career. He was born in Davao City on December 16, 1960 and retired from the police service in 2016. Lascanas had a change of heart when he almost died from a kidney transplant surgery, which took place in 2014. According to him, the memory of his two brothers, who were killed because of involvement in drug trade, haunted him after his surgery. The first information said:
“During his public confession, Lascañas narrated how he had given his imprimatur to the killing of his two brothers on account of his blind loyalty and obedience to then Mayor Duterte, who had a very tough campaign against illegal drugs. According to Lascañas, his brothers Cecilio and Fernando were into drugs as users and dealers, respectively. Knowing then Mayor Duterte’s strategy of killing suspected drug personalities and to show his loyalty and obedience, Lascañas gave consent to have his two brothers arrested, which subsequently resulted in his brothers being killed by his fellow policemen. This shows how the anti-drug campaign of then Mayor Duterte caused even the killing of the brothers of his key lieutenant in the war on drugs.”
Concerning his kidney transplant, the first information said:
“Arthur Lascañas testified in the Senate that in the middle of 2015, he underwent a kidney transplant and thought that he was on the verge of death, prompting him to confess all his sins to a priest. At that time, he dreamed of a demon haunting him, which gripped his conscience. He underwent a spiritual renewal. He made a journal of his criminal activities under the Davao Death Squad. Fortunately, he survived his kidney transplant. When he came to the Senate inquiry on 03 October 2016, in relation to the earlier testimony of Edgar Matobato, he was not prepared to tell the truth, because he feared for the security of his loved ones, who were then still in Davao. Besides, he was also told by his police colleagues in the Davao Death Squad to deny the earlier testimony of Edgar Matobato. After his retirement from the police force in December 2016, he had an encounter with a religious nun who later referred him to a high Catholic prelate to whom he made his confession.”
Media reports said private independent organizations in Davao City recorded 1,424 deaths from 1998 to 2015. Lascanas corroborated the claim, but scoffed at the number. “That is a small number. Those are only the bodies that were found. They did not find the bodies we had buried at the Laud Quarry and those we had dropped to the sea,” he said in a media account. Over 100 were allegedly minors. Lascanas confirmed the killing of a three-year-old child on diapers. Lascañas, the once-trusted murder squad leader said:
“Duterte cannot keep this hidden. It will all come out because of the magnitude of the deaths, even if we do not count the deaths in Manila when Duterte had become president.”
Subsequently, Lascañas again related the story about Paolo Duterte and Charlie Tan when the latter was suspected by Paolo of having a shipment of shabu (methamphetamine hydrochloride) from China, but which they did not seize allegedly on orders of Paolo himself. Lascañas thus charged: “There are about five drug lords there, including Peter Lim.”
MALACANANG SIDE
MALACANANG could not do much to counter what Lascanas said in his explosive expose, but to discredit him. In what was tantamount to a march of stupidity, the dimwitted Press Secretary Martin Andanar floated a rumor that reporters were paid $1,000 each to cover Lascanas’s press conference at the Senate premises on Feb. 20, 2017. He neither gave any piece of evidence nor offered proof. Andanar was said to have backtracked later from his ridiculous statement, but in doing so, he lost his position as one of Duterte’s spokesmen. By that time, he was relegated to doing the administrative side of Duterte’s communications network.
At the Senate, Duterte’s ally Sen. Richard Gordon deprived Lascañas of a venue to correct his October 2016 testimony where he said that the Davao Death Squad was a “myth.” He refused to have his committee on justice and human rights reopen Lascañas’s new testimony. But truth like water finds a way of flowing to its rightful level and audience. Sen. Panfilo Lacson, chair of the Senate committee on public order, gave the public the opportunity to hear Lascañas’s turnaround testimony, where he surprisingly gave more details on his role in the Davao Death Squad. Senators, who did moonlighting jobs as Malacanang’s defenders, could only resort to nitpick on Lascanas’s testimony. Sen. Tito Sotto could only raise doubts on Lascanas’s spiritual renewal. But their efforts hardly availed.
In his testimony before the Senate, Lascañas shared an incident involving the President’s son, Paolo, who was then the Davao City vice mayor. He narrated how Paolo once asked him to monitor a van, which he believed to contain illegal drugs that belonged to his acquaintance of his, a certain Charlie Tan. Lascañas said that when they were about to intercept the van, Paolo intervened and gave them a dressing down, indicating they were not serious and relentless in the campaign against illegal drugs. Lascanas said he regretted that they did not intercept the van even though his two brothers were killed in Duterte’s war on drugs in the city.
Two weeks after Lascañas’s testimony, Rodrigo Duterte said in an ambushed interview at Malacanang:” I have no plans of answering Lascañas’ rehashed lies.” He declined to say that he created the DDS. He declined to say if he gave money to Lascanas for his dialysis treatment. He refused practically all questions thrown at him in that interview.
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‘IN AID OF LEGISLATION’
GOING back to the first information, which lawyer Jude Josue Sabio submitted to the ICC, it made clear that what the Duterte government could afford was simply to engage in some congressional investigations that were merely “in aid of legislation,” which were directed to review existing public policies on illegal drugs with the intention to provide remedial amendments, or come out with new public policies. Although those inquiries generated tons of publicity to catch the public consciousness, it nevertheless did not go into the criminal liability of the parties involved in Duterte’s war on drugs. They were limited by the nature of congressional probes. It said:
“It has to be noted that the Senate investigation is only in aid of legislation; it is not geared towards the finding or determination of the criminal liability or responsibility of President Duterte which is what is specifically being brought before the International Criminal Court through this communication. In other words, in technical legal terms, the Senate exercised its legislative power over a subject matter in aid of legislation which is not the same as the situation being brought before the International Criminal Court through this communication, which is the criminal liability or responsibility of President Duterte over the continuing mass murder committed ever since by him through his Davao Death Squad in Davao City and later in his war on drugs at the national level after he became the President.”
On the contrary, the Senate probe became a convenient way to veer the public attention away from involved parties like Duterte. The information said:
“In its first Committee Report, Senator Richard Gordon as Chairman of the Committee on Justice and Human Rights, who is instrumental in the report, never recommended or pushed for the investigation by the Duterte administration into the direct participation of President Duterte in the Davao Death Squad and his potential criminal liability. Instead, out of bias and his political alliance with President Duterte, he prematurely concluded that the Davao Death Squad does not exist. The participation and potential criminal liability of President Duterte in the Davao Death Squad became much clearer in the testimony of Arthur Lascañas.
“Still, the Senate Committee on Public Order and Dangerous Drugs did not push or recommend for a national investigation by the Duterte administration into the personal involvement of President Duterte in the Davao Death Squad and his potential criminal liability therefor as well as his potential criminal liability for the extra-judicial executions in his war on drugs at the national level in the historical context of the Davao Death Squad.
“Neither has the Senate recommended nor can it be expected to recommend that the investigative agencies of the Duterte government, especially in the executive department, should conduct such kind of investigation into the personal involvement of President Duterte in the Davao Death Squad, his potential criminal liability therefor as well as his potential criminal liability for the extra-judicial executions carried out in his war on drugs in the historical and actual context of the Davao Death Squad.”
The information further said:
“The Senate is unwilling or unable to further conduct, or push or recommend for the conduct of, a national investigation by the Duterte administration specifically into the following, namely; (1) the personal involvement of President Duterte in the Davao Death Squad, and (2) his potential criminal liability or responsibility for his direct involvement and participation in the mass murder undertaken by him under his Davao Death Squad, and (3) his potential criminal liability or responsibility for the extra judicial executions in the war on drugs conducted at the National level. In turn, this unwillingness or inability of the Senate can be interpreted to mean as a direct intention to obstruct justice with the aim of shielding the President Duterte from being exposed to criminal liability.”
The conclusion:
“The fact that the investigation in the Senate has been intentionally rendered to be ‘inactive’ by its mere adjournment justifies the International Criminal Court to acquire complementary jurisdiction at this time.”
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