By Herbert Vego
WAS President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. serious when he declared his objection to the “jurisdiction” of the International Criminal Court (ICC) over his predecessor, Rodrigo “Digong” Duterte?
“A threat to our sovereignty” was how he opposed the ICC investigators’ intention to enter the country and arrest former President Rodrigo Duterte et al., who are being implicated in crimes against humanity.
He conceded to the media, however, that the said investigators can enter the country “as ordinary people” but would receive no help from any government agency.
According to a 2023 report by the Secretary of State of the United States, extra-judicial killings were the “most serious problem” during the Duterte era in the Philippines.
Based on information revealed by former Senator Antonio Trillanes IV, ICC investigators had arrived in the Philippines and communicated with around 50 active and former officials of the Philippine National Police (PNP) in connection with the drug war launched by Duterte.
The Supreme Court, however, has already declared that the Philippines is still obliged to cooperate in criminal proceedings of the ICC in a 15-0 decision promulgated in March 2021, in effect invalidating Duterte’s decision to isolate the Philippines from ICC investigation.
Even if Duterte’s questionable withdrawal from the ICC were valid, it would not affect investigation of crimes committed before its date in 2018 and within one year thereafter.
The President was lying through his teeth. He was one of the 17 Philippine senators who signed Senate Resolution No. 546 in 2011, concurring in the ratification of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC), the world’s first permanent tribunal for war crimes.
Under the treaty signed by representatives from 124 member countries, the ICC can step in when countries are unwilling or unable to dispense justice for the core crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes or crimes of aggression.
It was retired ICC’s retired prosecutor Fatou Bensouda of Gambia who asked the pre-trial chamber to investigate killings in Duterte’s drug war, and killings by the so-called Davao Death Squad (DDS) from 2011, the year the Philippines joined the ICC.
It’s hard to read Marcos’ refusal to cooperate with the ICC on Duterte, who has repeatedly hit him below the belt for being a “weak leader,” for reaching only “second year college” and for being “bangag”.
His natural reaction would have been to fight back, as his First Lady did in a well-replayed TV interview, but he could not even kick Vice President/Education Secretary Sara Duterte out of his Cabinet.
As to why he is so afraid of the Dutertes, sila lang mismo ang nakakaalam.
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GETTING TO KNOW THE RED AND YELLOW ALERTS
THERE has never been as ferocious summer heat as we experience this week. With day-time temperatures rising as high as 45°C, we are at the mercy of the power plants, the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) and the distribution utilities.
Sad to say, the NGCP is now hard put to transmit sufficient electricity. As the sole transmission grid, it is not in the position to squeeze electricity from the power plants which could not cope with the demand of distribution utilities (DUs) like MORE Power in Iloilo City and the electric cooperatives elsewhere. No wonder the NGCP has repeatedly been issuing either red or yellow-alert notices in conjunction with the DUs.
When in “red alert,” the power supply in the grid is so insufficient it may inevitably lead to rotational brownouts or manual load droppings.
Power supply may be classified as “yellow” whenever low power supply diminishes to critical levels but is not so bad as to trigger unscheduled outages.
According to the NGCP, there are at least 12 power plants in the Visayas that operate below their capacity to supply the grid. Certain “corrections” may also be made to revitalize the power lines.
Yesterday (April 25), for instance, MORE Power imposed a short shutdown of its La Paz Substation to restore normalcy to the Sta. Barbara-Ingore/Power Barge 69 kV sub-transmission line owned and maintained by NGCP.
This led to a 2-hour interruption (4:00 a.m.-6:00 a.m.) yesterday, which affected MORE Power customers being served by La Paz feeders 1,2,3,4, and 5. The correction was necessary to prevent overloading at Sta. Barbara Substation due to higher demands.
This resulted in isolation of MORE Power’s La Paz Substation from the Sta. Barbara-Ingore line connecting to Guimaras. The said line had encountered faults originating from the Guimaras Wind Farm, thus triggering outages of La Paz Substation. The La Paz Substation is now connected to Sta. Barbara-Baldoza line.
