Priest says he voted for Duterte as president, not as God

Ateneo de Davao president Fr. Joel Tabora, S.J. said President Rodrigo Duterte might be dismayed to find out that hell, a place Duterte claims he isn’t afraid to go to, is filled with drug lords and addicts who have all died from his war on drugs.

“After fighting his war on drugs to rid the Philippines of drug addicts and drug lords, the president may be dismayed to discover that hell is filled with the drug lords and drug addicts who’ve perished in his war — to say nothing of all the selfish rich he’s loathed for making their millions oppressing the poor he loves,” Tabora wrote in a blog post titled “Choosing between Hell with Duterte and Heaven with the CBCP.”

The Jesuit priest confessed that he feels partly responsible for the innocent lives that may have been taken due to his silence on the issue and explained that his support for the government’s war on drugs came from his “hatred for the evil that the illegal drug trade brings its victims, rich and poor” and is anchored on the premise that Duterte promised to follow the law.

“As far as how this war is conducted, I have opted to allow the commander–in-chief the discretion to marshal the means necessary to win the war. Talking tough seemed to be necessary for the campaign, just as oft repeating that he would protect his policemen from jail should they be prosecuted in the line of duty,” he said.

“I was content to presume that lives taken by the police were taken legitimately — as the result of a police operation resisted foolishly by the drug users.”

SUPPORT FOR CBCP
Tabora also backed Church leaders who criticized Duterte’s war on drugs, saying he would rather to “go to heaven” with members of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) instead of “going to hell” with Duterte.

“If I must choose between going to hell with President Duterte in pursuit of the war on drugs in the Philippines or going to heaven with (Archbishop) Soc Villegas because neither he nor any of the Catholic Bishops of the Philippines ‘find pleasure in the death of anyone who dies’ (cf. Ezekiel 18:32), I choose going to heaven with the CBCP, even if their company and their language is neither as colorful nor as entertaining as that of the President,” he said.

A pastoral letter by the CBCP criticized the government anti-narcotics crackdown for terrorizing the poor and reiterated that killing people was not the answer to the drug menace.

“An even greater cause of concern is the indifference of many to this kind of wrong. It is considered as normal, and, even worse, something that (according to them) needs to be done,” the bishops said.

Following the release of the pastoral letter, Malacañang fired back at the CBCP, saying the public now feels a “reign of peace” instead of the terror described by bishops.

Tabora said he wrote Duterte on his ballot last year, because he believed he would be a good leader.

“My vote for Rodrigo Roa Duterte was a vote for him as President of the Philippines. It was not a vote for him as God. Nor a vote for him as the Evil One,” he said.

He added that he was happy when “finally, we had an independent-minded man from the masses of Mindanao with a heart for the poor who would wield the powers of secular government towards greater social justice,” but later on cringed when Duterte began to talk as if he were the “Evil One.”

“As the number of killed rose, I was quieted by the president’s general declarations that he is not responsible for extra-judicial killings. There were, after all, many other plausible sources of the killings: turf wars among the drug pushers, rogue policemen covering their tracks, operations of the cartels to discredit legitimate police operations,” he said.

Seven months since its launch, thousands of people have been killed in the government’s bloody campaign against illegal drugs, with most of the casualties killed in police operations.

Duterte has repeatedly been criticized by local and international human rights advocates but the 71-year-old leader has repeatedly dismissed criticisms. 

“I believe it is better to battle evil on the side of God rather than on the side of the Evil One,” Tabora concluded.

This story first appeared on ABS-CBN News Online and republished with permission.