March 11 was a day of reckoning. Contemporary off a airplane on the Manila worldwide airport, former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte was flanked and detained beneath an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court for alleged crimes in opposition to humanity.
“That is deeply private for me,” mentioned former Philippine senator Leila de Lima, a Duterte critic since cleared of drug-related prices that jailed her for almost seven years, in a statement. Randy delos Santos, the uncle of a teen killed in police anti-drug operations in Manila in August 2017, told the Related Press that it was “an enormous, long-awaited day for justice.”
Duterte had overseen a crackdown on illicit medication for over 20 years, first as mayor of Davao Metropolis after which as Philippine President from 2016 to 2022. The marketing campaign led to as many as 30,000 deaths, most of them poor Filipinos.
Duterte’s arrest—and the incumbent Ferdinand Marcos Jr. Administration’s cooperation in it—additionally marks a turning level within the nation’s politics.
“Within the brief time period, that is the start of the tip of the Duterte political dynasty,” says Jean Encinas-Franco, a political science professor on the College of the Philippines.
Dubbed “Asia’s Trump” for his rhetoric and unorthodox governance, Duterte was elected as President by a landslide nearly a decade in the past on the promise of a no-holds-barred crackdown on criminality.
Upon taking workplace, he made true to his promise together with his “struggle on medication.” He additionally launched misogynistic tirades and clamped down on critics and press freedom.
Whereas his crackdowns provoked outrage across the globe, Duterte and his model of politics remained popular at residence even after he left workplace. His daughter Sara Duterte-Carpio, driving on her household title, was elected Vice President in 2022 in a landslide victory alongside President Marcos Jr., himself the son of a former dictator who dominated the Philippines from 1965 to 1986.
However the two households fell out over an influence battle. A ballot by WR Numero Research exhibits Duterte-Carpio as among the many most well-liked candidates in presidential elections due in 2028, and the elder Duterte is seeking to reclaim his post as mayor of Davao Metropolis in midterm elections in Might.
In the meantime, the Duterte patriarch and President Marcos have traded drug use allegations. The previous President has additionally accused his successor of veering the Philippines towards a dictatorship. Final November, Vice President Duterte-Carpio even publicly threatened to have Marcos assassinated.
The feedback, in addition to different allegations in opposition to Duterte-Carpio, prompted the Home of Representatives, lots of whom are Marcos allies, to impeach her final month.
Marcos had beforehand been vocal about refusing to cooperate with the ICC on its probe against Duterte. However in January, the Marcos Administration mentioned it would “respond favorably” if the ICC seeks an Interpol arrest warrant.
Richard Heydarian, a Manila-based political analyst and senior lecturer on the College of the Philippines, tells TIME that the Marcos Administration has “minimize off the top of the snake” with the arrest, after months of taking a much less confrontational method with the household. He provides that if Duterte is distributed to The Hague, it will sign to Marcos’ allies within the Senate to expedite the impeachment proceedings in opposition to Duterte-Carpio.
For political analyst Antonio Contreras, it’s too early to say how Duterte’s arrest will have an effect on the upcoming native elections or the looming presidential contest in 2028. However the “feeling of invincibility earlier than that [Duterte] can now not be held accountable,” he says, “is now being reversed.”
