FACING ACCOUNTABILITY

March 22, 2025 Opinion

There is something to be said about those who claim to be courageous, totally unafraid and absolutely committed to a chosen course of action or advocacy and then later on backtracks and find ways and means to avoid accountability when the proverbial s_ _ t hits the fan.
Take for instance Senator Bato Dela Rosa who, during the administration of former president Rodrigo Duterte, was considered as the architect of the war on drugs campaign that extra judicially killed thousands of suspected criminals, drug addicts, pushers and producers
of illegal drugs. To recall it was during his stint as PNP chief from 2016 to 2018, when the war on drugs exploded in the streets and sidewalks, and in just a few months after his appointment, official reports form the Philippine National Police (PNP) already recorded a death toll of over 3,000.

He cannot in anyway deny that he had no knowledge about the war on drugs campaign of his mentor and ninong Duterte considering that when the latter took office as president he was immediately promoted as the newly minted chief of the PNP. And before he was the head
honcho of the PNP he was previously assigned to Mindanao and other Davao posts where he ostensibly established close relationships
with the Duterte Family. When suspected drug users and pushers started turning up dead in the streets for allegedly committing acts of resistance against the authorities under the theory of “nanlaban” no meaningful investigation was conducted by the PNP to determine the culpability of their colleagues in such operations. During that time it was then bruited about that it is “open season” for all those involved in the illegal drugs business with vigilante groups and not a few cops involved in hunting and terminating their existence.

The administration then of former president Duterte knew about this, since it was the former president himself while campaigning for presidency who declared that he plans to kill all those involved in criminal and drug syndicates. The public knew about this because right after Duterte sat in Malacanang bodies of alleged criminals and drug users and pushers started turning up and being reported in the news.
Back then even before he became president Duterte was already known as the mayor who eradicated criminality and drugs in Davao in the most brutal way via “salvaging” or extrajudicial killings by a group known as the Davao Death Squad, which the former president, in one House inquiry session startlingly admitted was formed by him using prisoners incarcerated in jails.

Obviously therefore Senator Bato when he was then the Chief PNP during the time of Duterte knew about all of these neutralizations that happened as a consequence of the violent conduct of the war on drugs. He knew that people would die, and people actually died, because of the Duterte version of the war on drugs but he did nothing to prevent it and instead conspiring with the former president made sure that the violent war on drugs was effectively waged. So in all aspects surrounding the implementation of the Philippine drug war former Chief PNP and now Senator Bato Dela Rosa is directly accountable and culpable for the extra judicial killings that happened in the country during the Duterte regime, along with his ninong of course who is now detained in the Hague, in the Netherlands.

Like his godfather who now faces the prospect of being tried in the International Criminal Court (ICC) for alleged crimes against humanity is Senator Bato also brave enough to face the music and willing to defend himself to proclaim his innocence? At this stage one would find it difficult to believe that the senator is willing to hand himself to the ICC because right now all he is thinking is how to evade those who would cause his arrest through a warrant and how to hide himself from being tried in the ICC by any means possible. But as with any organized society where laws are to a great extent dutifully obeyed and followed, accountability is always a potent weapon governments use to regulate its public servants, and even private citizens so that no one should be above the law. That accountability will, in the end,
catch up with Senator Dela Rosa, whether he is prepared for it or not.