By Manny Mogato
(August 12, 2021) – President Rodrigo Duterte, who may face investigation for crimes against humanity before The Hague, could have a similar fate with Sudan’s former strongman who will be handed over to the International Criminal Court (ICC), a left-wing party-list group warned on Thursday.
Akbayan praised Sudan after it decided to hand over Omar al-Bashir who ruled the African country for three decades with an iron fist to the ICC to face charges of war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity.
“The message is clear: All tyrants face a day of reckoning. They will eventually be arrested, held to account and prosecuted for their crimes against the people,” Akbayan spokesman Dr. RJ Naguit said in a statement, adding Sudan’s action “sends a powerful message against modern authoritarianism that will ripple around the world.”
“This is the same fate that awaits Mr. Rodrigo Duterte. After Omar al-Bashir, the world will come after Duterte. Today, it is al-Bashir. Tomorrow, it is Duterte.”
In Sudan, al-Bashir and his Arab-dominated government were blamed for the killing of 300,000 people after a violent war erupted in Darfur, the country’s southern territory in 2003. More than 2.5 million people were also displaced.
Al-Bashir rose to power in 1989 after a military coup but was toppled following a popular uprising in 2019. He has been convicted of corruption in Khartoum. The decision to turn him over to the ICC was announced by Sudan’s foreign minister after the ICC chief prosecutor Karim Khan met with civilian and military leaders.
The ICC issued an arrest order against al-Bashir in 2009. There was no timeframe for al-Bashir’s handover.
Akbayan said Duterte could face a similar fate after he steps down from power in June 2022. The ICC will decide to investigate him for thousands of people killed in the drug war.
Police said it has killed about 6,000 drug peddlers and users but all in self-defense after they resisted arrests. But the former ICC chief prosecutor found a disturbing pattern of killings from 2016 to 2019 when the Philippines was still a party of the ICC.
The chief prosecutor, in a report, said the killings were similar when Duterte was still Mayor in Davao City from 2011 until he was elected president in 2016.
“Duterte’s days are drawing to a close. The long arm of the law will eventually catch him,” Naguit said.
“Justice will find its way and in the end, prevail. And Duterte knows this. It is this fear of eventual accountability that propels him to scramble and continue his inept and violent rule. He and his enablers know that eventually, the full force of the international community and the rule of law will bear down on them, hard.”
“The Filipino people are finding their voices, pushing back and rejecting Duterte’s attempt to continue his tyrannical rule beyond 2022,” he added.
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