Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Juan Ponce Enrile has dismissed claims that former President Rodrigo Duterte was “kidnapped” and illegally brought to the International Criminal Court (ICC), calling such accusations baseless and contrary to the country’s legal framework.
In a Facebook post on Tuesday, Enrile addressed criticisms from Duterte supporters, including legal scholars, who accused President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.’s administration of violating national sovereignty by allegedly handing over Duterte to the ICC.
“Many of his supporters and admirers—some of whom are learned academicians and legal scholars—claim that FPRRD’s (Duterte) arrest was bereft of due process and that his delivery to the ICC for trial in the Netherlands was in violation of our dignity and sovereignty as a country,” Enrile wrote. “With due respect to all, I beg to disagree.”
Enrile emphasized that the Philippines is committed to international law and the principles of a democratic government.
“We are a country governed by rule of law and a regime of justice. We are a democratic and republican state. Sovereignty resides in the people and all government authority emanates from them,” he said. “We adopt the generally accepted principles of international law as a part of the law of our land.”
He stressed the importance of separation of powers, saying, “The legislative branch makes the laws; the executive branch implements them; and the judiciary interprets them.”
Enrile questioned how the President could be accused of kidnapping Duterte when all actions are bound by constitutional and legal mandates. “Now coming back to the ICC case of FPRRD, how can anyone validly claim that BBM kidnapped FPRRD and delivered him to the ICC for trial in the Netherlands in the face of all the constitutional principles I have recited in this post and the provisions of Republic Act No. 9861, especially Chapter VII thereof?” he asked.
Highlighting the President’s oath of office, Enrile said: “My position is very simple: I will not burn the whole house to save the ass of a cook whose error, negligence, or hubris caused a fire in the kitchen.”
Duterte was arrested in Manila on March 11 and transferred to The Hague the same day to face trial for crimes against humanity in relation to his administration’s bloody drug war. He appeared before the ICC in a pretrial hearing on March 14 via video link.
While official records place the death toll of the drug war at over 6,000, human rights groups estimate the number of deaths between 12,000 to 30,000 from 2016 to 2019.
