NAAWAN, Misamis Oriental (MindaNews / 12 March) — The wheel of justice might be slow in turning but doesn’t stop in turning and thus catches up with those with accountabilities in due time. Such is the plight of former President Rodrigo Roa Duterte who was immediately shipped to The Hague after his dramatic arrest on an International Criminal Court (ICC) warrant for committing a crime against humanity, over a brutal, years-long anti-drugs crackdown that left thousands of citizens dead.
The day of reckoning has finally come.
While President, Duterte made it a policy to eliminate suspected drug personalities. He encouraged everyone to kill drug addicts and promised rewards for any accomplishments. This resulted in a spate of extra-judicial killings (EJK) involving the police and riding-in-tandem vigilantes. His user end of the anti-drug campaign littered the streets and nooks of poor communities with the bodies of EJK victims. Tens of thousands of drug victims or addicts were snuffed of their lives but the monstrous policy hardly scratched those responsible for their misery – the drug lords.
Duterte was, in fact, very close to the publicly known king of kings of drug lords, Michael Yang, and even brought him to the Palace as his economic adviser.
His association with Michael Yang led some observers that Digong’s war on drugs was just a smokescreen for his drug business partnership with Yang.
Yang was not only in the commerce of illegal drugs but also in the operation of the Philippine Offshore Gambling Operation (POGO), which figures in human trafficking, money laundering, torture, and murder.
Who is next to ride free a charted jet to The Hague tribunal?
First in the line is likely Duterte’s henchman former PNP Chief Ronald “Bato” Dela Rosa, the architect of Tokhang and Oplan Double Barrel, now a senator, followed by Sara Duterte, who is the organizer “pasimuno” of Davao Death Squad (DDS), and then by Bong Go, the alleged bagman of Digong, according to their accuser, Arturo Lascañas, the confessed hitman of the Dutertes when they lorded over Davao City.
All three were the co-accused of former President Duterte. In a matter of time, they will be together in The Hague. Hail. Hail the gang is here!
Indeed, crime does not pay. It’s a free ride to Amsterdam.
(MindaViews is the opinion section of MindaNews. William R. Adan, Ph.D., is retired professor and former chancellor of Mindanao State University at Naawan, Misamis Oriental.)