The Tamesis
May 25, 2026
Manila – Senator Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa, the former Philippine National Police chief under President Rodrigo Duterte, is now a fugitive, hunted by the agency he once commanded. He slipped out of the Senate in the early hours of the morning to evade an International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrant and left the Senate in a panic, with security forces firing shots to create the impression that the Senate was under attack.
The irony is almost too obvious: The man who oversaw a drug war that killed thousands could not muster the courage to face a single arrest warrant. He ran away. That’s all that needs to be said about Bartó de la Rosa. The more important revelation is that he was so different from the people he served, a difference that tells us something about the nature of impunity as an element of populist power.
The worst aspect of impunity is not just the ability to break the law and avoid punishment. It is a form of power that works by projecting an aura of invincibility. Those who exercise power don’t just evade responsibility; He appears to be above the authority holding him accountable. This is the mystery of impunity. People stand in awe before it, institutions hesitate before it. Followers grew bolder and even some critics, realizing the futility of resistance, fell silent.
This is the kind of power Rodrigo Duterte has exercised during his violent presidency. When he was no longer president and appeared at congressional hearings to face questions about the thousands of deaths, he seemed almost unfazed. Yes, he said, actually: I ordered it. So be it. The legislators who questioned him were visibly deferential, reminding him almost apologetically that he was admitting to a crime. He just shrugged. He was never formally charged in a Philippine court. The victims’ families, unable to get justice at home, decided to take the case to the International Criminal Court.
His response to the International Criminal Court was the most blatant expression of impunity. He only unilaterally withdrew the Philippines from the Rome Statute with minimal resistance. This is a statement that even international law does not apply to him. His followers saw this as validation of what they already believed: that he was beyond the reach of any law. His subordinates came to their own conclusion: they, too, were protected because they were acting on his orders.
What ultimately broke the halo of immunity was not legal wrangling but political calculation. As long as the Marcos-Duterte alliance exists, the ICC arrest warrant will be a dead letter. The arrests would have been impossible without state cooperation. But that shield evaporated when the Duterte family became a liability rather than an asset to the Marcos presidency. Suddenly, the law had room to move.
I suspect Duterte knows what is coming. He could have stayed in Hong Kong for the holidays and his ties to China’s leaders would have made extradition impossible. After returning home, he sincerely believed that his presence would stop the arresting officers. He has become a prisoner of his own mystique.
But he was wrong about one man: General Nicolás Torre without hesitation. He arrested Duterte, calmly read him his rights, and despite Duterte’s delays, escorted him to a plane and handed him over to the custody of the International Criminal Court. The mystery has been weakened but not broken.
Opinion polls show that Duterte’s aura remains with his daughter, Vice President Sara Duterte, who is gearing up for a 2028 presidential bid. Her allies in the Senate are doing their best to block any legal or political proceedings that might keep her from the vote. The regrettable spectacle of recent days — fabricated panic, fugitive senators surfacing only to vote for a new Senate president, shots fired at ghosts — is part of a rearguard action to protect the remnants of Duterte’s culture of impunity.
But the spectacle also shows that this sense of mystery isn’t always transferable. The meme that emerged after Bartó de la Rosa fell on the stairs proves this. So did those who mocked senators who panicked when their own security guards fired shots.
Sara Duterte is a different and more serious issue. She is biologically her father’s daughter. She had a feisty personality and was good at channeling the resentment of those who felt vengeful for her father’s audacity. Whether she possesses enough mystique to recreate the system of impunity around her is something we cannot yet answer.
The 2028 elections will provide the answer. If the Filipino people choose to return the Duterte brand to power—now knowing what it will cost and seeing where it’s going—impunity will not just exist. It will be approved. Sanctioned impunity is far more dangerous than simply evading the law, since then it would be democratically mandated. Only voters who refuse to be seduced by the mystique of defiant power can end the culture of impunity.
