WHAT difference in the commemoration of Rodrigo Duterte’s birthday from the decades of his murderous reign– as a city mayor and as president of the republic– marks his 80th on Friday that is to wane at the Scheveningen prison in The Hague.
That his extended family, his former wife and his present partner along with their children, hope to be by his side in what is known as “The Hague Hilton” signals the grim reality of Duterte spending the rest of his life in prison in a foreign country.
It was confirmed no less by his daughter, impeached Vice President Sara Duterte, who relayed her father’s resignation to the fact that his fate (if not his not excesses in power) had led him to his cell in The Netherlands.
“My father will no longer return,” she said, and it should have resonated with the Duterte followers who are now more engaged in optics and political noise but whose acts will not sway the International Criminal Court (ICC) to order his release albeit temporarily.
They’d rather believe in a Duterte second coming, but that is too much a comparison with the God he had cussed a number of times– perhaps the same God the elder Duterte now leans on for his salvation.
Again, that’s too much for a comparison.
That Sara had told her father he would be likened to Ninoy Aquino if Digong could still return to the country yet it’s a story stretched too far.
The opposition senator who was martyred on the tarmac of an airport now named after him does not deserve to be compared with the dictator who is being tried for 43 cases of crimes against humanity in the ICC.
Ninoy is a hero. Duterte is not.
Those 43 cases are a small fraction of the deaths perpetrated by his death squad when he was still the mayor of Davao City and a portion of the 30,000 deaths caused by the police and the vigilante squads he supported when he was still president.
Digong had thought he could escape justice from the ICC but his withdrawal from the Rome Statute came too late in March 2019.
By then, there had been too many deaths, too many murders committed at night and even in broad daylight.
There’ll be no returning to the Philippines for him.
The lawyers representing the victims are convinced of the airtight cases that would merit Digong’s life imprisonment.
Digong had balked at human rights when he dealt with the supposed scoundrels of the streets.
It’s the same set of human rights that protects him now at the Hague.
There’ll be no big parties for him anymore, however.
Celebration means for him a small company, if the ICC allows, in a 10-square-meter cell. No more big rallies await his attendance, however late he arrives.
His movements will be less and are monitored. He’ll be seen when he visits a small bathroom. The ICC will know when he connects to the internet, watches the television, reads a book in the library, cooks, or goes to the gym.
All this because he needs to be alive when he faces Lady Justice.
All this is because power wanes and clout dissolves. It’s because not every day is your birthday, Digong.
