THE WORLD TURNS GREEN
30 March 2025
By Atty Harry Roque
The World Turns Green
Atty. Harry Roque
Last Friday, March 28, 2025, the world turned green as we witnessed one of the largest synchronized peaceful rallies and prayer gatherings ever held. The occasion is the 80th birthday of former President of the Philippines Rodrigo Duterte. For 24 hours, all freedom-loving Filipinos showed their genuine love to fPRRD who is still courageously facing uphill political and legal battles in the sunset of his life. Indeed, a true leader brings people together.
Think about this: A mammoth crowd of Filipinos in multiple countries and cities, chanting “Bring Him Home,” for an octogenarian ex-president. Visual is king and the world would ask why these Filipinos are there and would fully grasp the real score, which is, the state-sanctioned kidnapping orchestrated by the government of Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr., son and namesake of former dictator and kleptocrat Ferdinand E. Marcos, Sr.
Whether he admits it or not, President Marcos Jr. committed a colossal blunder when he shamelessly handed over private citizen Rodrigo Duterte to the International Criminal Court (ICC) in a silver platter.
Preliminary findings from the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations chaired by Senator Imee Marcos showed that government had no legal obligation to arrest fPRRD, and that the Philippine government decided to assist the ICC to arrest fPRRD, and finally, there were glaring violations of the rights of fPRRD.
There was no Red Notice from the Interpol. A Red Notice, for the information of our dear readers, is not an arrest warrant. Mind you, the Palace Press Officer cannot derisively dismiss this as “fake news, fake news.” Presidential sister Senator Imee Marcos has confirmed that the Philippine government issued a Diffusion Notice, which became the basis of PRRD’s unlawful arrest without due process to the Hague.
It is clear as the sky: the March 11 kidnapping of Rodrigo Duterte is all about politics. The current administration simply wanted to eliminate competition -- the Dutertes -- in the political landscape in the dastardly attempt to put in place the Marcos Forever plan.
Interestingly, Timor-Leste – the youngest nation in Asia, just 23 years old – boldly rejected the extradition of former lawmaker Arnolfo Teves Jr. This undoubtedly demonstrates our Southeast Asian neighbor has more sense of sovereignty than the Philippines, Asia’s first republic, which handed a Filipino to a foreign tribunal.
All eyes are now with fPRRD, and with the massive outpour of support from our kababayans in more than 125 countries, the Filipino leader has gained the world as his audience. Duterte is now being hailed as a modern-day Mahatma Gandhi while Marcos Jr. is gaining notoriety as a modern-day Judas Iscariot.
To prove my point: Only an inmate named Rodrigo Duterte can turn a dreaded ICC prison in the Netherlands into a Facebook-worthy Filipino tourist spot. I am a personal witness and truly this enduring love of Filipinos’ for the Philippines most beloved leader is one for the books.
On a serious note, as a political detainee of the House of Representatives, I have a better understanding of the adage, life without liberty is a body without spirit. I find it therefore unthinkable that the former president has to stay even a day in prison without knowing the evidence comprising the bases for the issuance of his warrant of arrest.
FPPRD’s defense team just received this week, or more than 10 days after the former leader’s detention in The Hague, the first set of evidence, consisting of 181 items tagged as “Pre-Confirmation INCRIM package 001,” from ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan.
This forms part of the “Disclosure of Evidence” Process to ensure that the ex-president Duterte is “informed of the evidence on which the prosecution intends to rely” during the Confirmation of Charges hearing scheduled six months from now. This is crucial to uphold the rights of a fair trial for the accused while ensuring that justice is served.
The ICC, like other courts in Europe, follows the inquisitorial legal framework, in contrast with the Philippines’ adversarial legal system, where the prosecution and defense gather evidence, present their respective cases and make arguments before the judge. The role of the judge is to oversee the trial and to rule on legal matters, unlike in the inquisitorial system where the judge takes a more active role in investigating the case
It remains to be seen what will happen next. The world is closely watching the ICC and it doesn’t help that Filipinos around the world have made a pilgrimage to the Hague to express their enduring love with Tatay Digong.
In the meantime, in the Philippines, Marcos Jr. seems to have an obsessive disorder with the Dutertes. Not a single day passes by without PRRD or VP Inday being mentioned in the Palace press briefings. Why zero in on the Dutertes when the current administration can boast its accomplishments. Not unless there is nothing PCO Usec. Claire Castro can boast. Have you heard of updates of new projects, insightful policy initiatives, or groundbreaking achievements?
The Philippines is not going anywhere. We have become a country run by bumbling quislings who easily surrendered our sovereignty. The Marcos Jr. administration is beyond redemption. And there seems to be no light at the end of the tunnel to at least look forward to.
Good save the Philippines.
