Senator Ronald “Bato” de la Rosa dared critics to cut his head off if the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) can prove that the extra-judicial killings occurring in the Philippines are state-sponsored.
The neophyte senator said this today when asked by the media in Camp Crame, the Philippine National Police’s (PNP) Quezon City headquarters, about his reaction to the UNHRC’s decision to investigate the killings that were committed in connection to the drug war.
“I will have my head cut off if this (killings) is state-sponsored. You come here and cut my head off,” de la Rosa said.
The drug war is closely linked to de la Rosa who launched it in 2016 as President Rodrigo Duterte’s first PNP chief.
De la Rosa also dared the UNHRC to come to the country to see the effects of the drug war themselves.
“Come here so that you will know that you are being fooled by those who are reporting to you,” he said in a mix of English and Filipino. “You were misled by these people who are out to bring this government down.”
He also said that he’s not afraid for the UNHCR to investigate his role in the drug war.
“I have nothing to fear. They can investigate if they want. They can investigate what they want to know, provided that they investigate with an open mind. They should not lump the cases into one. They should investigate [each case] one by one.”
De la Rosa said the UNHRC should look into what occurred in each extra-judicial killing case.
“If there are 22,000 cases of EJK (extra-judicial killing) as a result of the war on drugs, go ahead, they should look for the 22,000 cases. I challenge them; they should produce these 22,000 cases. You want the truth? Look at it one by one. Where’s the case, where’s the victim? Don’t go around trying to scare us.”
While the PNP said that 6,600 drug suspects have been killed in the drug war from June 2016 to May 2019, this number has often been questioned by human rights defenders. Back in December, the Philippines’ Commission on Human Rights said that the number could be as high as 27,000.
“Come on down,” de la Rosa dared. “So that you’ll be shocked to learn that you were being fooled by your informants here. You were given the wrong numbers.”
De la Rosa also slammed the UNHRC for approving the resolution that asked for the investigation into the drug war, something he perceives as an intrusion into the Philippines.
“Why are they intruding into the Philippines’ domestic affairs? Do you think their countries don’t have problems of their own? We should also ask who’s funding them. Whose behind them? We should ask,” he fumed.
Meanwhile, current PNP chief Director General Oscar Albayalde suggested that some of the cases in the death toll cited by human rights groups may not be drug-related at all.
“Not all of these are drug-related. Maybe they also included reckless imprudence resulting in homicide. Road accidents. Heart attacks. But I can assure the Filipino people that these are all being investigated,” he said.
Iceland filed the resolution calling for an investigation into the drug war last week. Yesterday, 18 out of the UNHCR’s 47 members voted in favor of it, while 14 voted against it and 15 abstained. Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. called the resolution’s approval a “travesty” and warned that there will be consequences for those who voted for the resolution.
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