ATTENTION: Congress of the Philippines, justices of the Supreme Court, Department of Justice (DOJ), and Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) and their attached agencies, Integrated Bar of the Philippines, Philippine Bar Association and other lawyer groups, Philippine Judicial Academy and other legal education institutions nationwide. Plus: Filipinos who value our sovereignty and rule of law.
The unwarranted intrusion of overseas legal systems into our nation not only insults our legislative, judicial and enforcement institutions, but also undermines our sovereignty and the rights of Filipinos mandated by the Constitution.
Hence, we applaud the refusal of the Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA) to allow the 4,000-hectare planned artificial intelligence (AI) hub in New Clark City to fall under American laws and jurisprudence. That’s what the United States reportedly stipulated in its Pax Silica program to attract global investors for AI, microchip, critical minerals and other technology industries.
“No special arrangement to be accorded to the US government,” BCDA President and CEO Joshua Bingcang told media last week. “There are two [Philippine] laws that will govern the transaction here: the Investors Lease Act and then the BCDA law ... So, it will be treated as a regular business development contract.”
Plainly, if BCDA treated Pax Silica ventures differently, locators of other zones could demand similar privileges. What if businesses wouldn’t come without the US legal regime? Well, we’ve seen what happens when Americans are exempted from our laws, as they were until US bases closed in 1991 and as they are now under the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) granting US access to our military bases.
Moreover, far more worrisome for tech investors than our laws is the war risk from Washington weaponizing our country, especially Luzon, for hostilities with Beijing over Taiwan (https://tinyurl.com/mprua7t3). Just ask America’s e-commerce giant Amazon, whose Middle East data centers were bombed in the US-Israel war on Iran.
Also, Pax Silica implements the US National Security Industrial Policy to boost weapons and military equipment production. One wonders why Washington would put industries supporting its and its allies’ forces within range of tens of thousands of Chinese projectiles and drones.
No to ICC intrusion
Unlike BCDA, however, no kudos for the DOJ, DILG and their law enforcement arms, National Bureau of Investigation and Philippine National Police, so quick to heed arrest warrants from the International Criminal Court (ICC) at The Hague, the Netherlands, for former president Rodrigo Duterte last year and Sen. Ronald “Bato” Dela Rosa recently. This is despite big reasons to question ICC jurisdiction over our country.
Malacañang, too, is rushing to set aside Philippine sovereignty and rule of law in favor of the foreign court. Saying more ICC warrants are expected “because there are many co-perpetrators,” Presidential Communications Office Undersecretary Claire Castro stressed in Filipino, translated by state media: “Whatever the government’s stance is right now, that is what will be enforced.”
So, as it did with Duterte and Dela Rosa, upon receiving future warrants, the government would pursue those sought by the ICC. That may include not just Sen. Bong Go, Duterte’s closest aide said to be under investigation, but also Vice President Sara Duterte, reportedly being probed for deaths when she was Davao City mayor during her father’s presidency. And surprise, surprise: ICC arrest could still block her presidential candidacy if she is acquitted in her impeachment trial.
No matter that international law experts and even ICC judges have persuasively argued that the court has no jurisdiction over the Philippine cases it is prosecuting, as fellow columnist Rigoberto Tiglao reported.
Although preliminary fact-finding started in 2017, the court sought jurisdiction only with formal case proceedings in 2021 — two years after our country withdrew from the Rome Statute creating the ICC, which barred jurisdiction (“International legal experts say ICC has no jurisdiction,” https://tinyurl.com/3rfcs8hc).
Prosecute Duterte and Bato here
Even more crucial is Article 17 of the Rome Statute, stipulating that the ICC is a court of last resort which assumes jurisdiction only if a state is deemed “unwilling” or “unable” to genuinely investigate or prosecute alleged crimes against humanity.
Now, can we truthfully say that the current Philippine criminal justice system — our law enforcement agencies under President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and our judiciary under the Supreme Court — is unwilling or unable to properly investigate and prosecute drug-war killings under then-president Duterte?
Of course, not. A government willing and able to arrest a former president and pursue a sitting senator can very well investigate and file charges against them, detain them without bail for alleged capital crimes, give protection to witnesses, and render swift and impartial justice. This regime has zero reason to let foreigners half a world away perform its duty of enforcing our laws.
Surely, President Marcos and the Supreme Court will affirm this fact — unless they wish to be impeached for breach of public trust and culpable violation of the Constitution in skirting their paramount duty of upholding our laws, meting out justice and safeguarding the citizenry’s rights and well-being.
So, rather than swiftly serving ICC warrants, Malacañang, the DOJ and the DILG should call for testimonies about drug-war deaths from 2016 to 2022 and quickly build up cases against perpetrators. For sure, with Marcos promising witness protection, police and prosecutors will get many times more testimonies, police and forensic reports in a few months than all the evidence the ICC now has.
While there are several thousand drug-war deaths, it just takes one rubout with solid evidence of orders from drug-war leaders for them to be convicted and jailed for murder. And if there are incontrovertible testimonies against senators and the vice president, the public would demand justice, and Congress would need no budgetary inducements to impeach and convict.
Those fearing unrest should remember that despite mass protests, former president Joseph Estrada was convicted of plunder in 2007, though pardoned due to his age.
So, Mr. President and Honorable Supreme Court Justices, will you demonstrate that our rule of law works — or cop out to the ICC?
