Gunshots rang out on Wednesday inside the Philippine Senate building in Manila, and calls to take cover were heard within it, eyewitnesses told Reuters. Simultaneously, military forces were deployed inside the building as security forces attempted to arrest a senator pursuant to an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
The senator in question is Ronald "Bato" dela Rosa, the former national police chief who served under President Rodrigo Duterte. The ICC issued a warrant for dela Rosa's arrest on Monday on suspicion of crimes against humanity, as part of the ongoing case against Duterte and his associates over the "war on drugs" they waged between 2016 and 2022. Duterte himself was arrested in March of this year and is currently held in custody in The Hague, after the Philippines surrendered him to the court.
On Monday, hours after the ICC published the arrest warrant, dela Rosa was seen fleeing into the Senate building as agents of the National Bureau of Investigation pursued him, and he barricaded himself inside. According to the Philippine News Agency, the government's official newswire, he was placed under "protective custody."
The episode marked a fresh eruption of the conflict between the central dynasties of Philippine politics. The Marcos family returned to power in 2022 with the election of Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to the presidency, decades after his father, dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr., was ousted in a popular uprising in 1986. The Duterte family rose to prominence during Rodrigo Duterte's presidency from 2016 to 2022, which became notorious for his anti-drug operations that left thousands dead, many of them innocent, and before that, he served as mayor of Davao City in the south of the country.
The alliance between the two dynasties peaked in 2022, when Marcos Jr. and Sara Duterte ran together for president and vice president, winning by a wide margin. The alliance quickly collapsed, however, and the conflict between the two sides escalated, leading Marcos to order the arrest of Sara's father in March of this year and surrender him to The Hague.
On Monday, dela Rosa resurfaced after months in hiding to vote on the removal of the Senate president and the appointment of an ally of the Duterte family. The maneuver was interpreted as an attempt to block the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte, the former president's daughter, whom the House of Representatives voted to impeach for the second time within a year on Monday, over allegations of corruption and misuse of government funds. Hours later, the ICC published the arrest warrant against him.
On Wednesday, from his office, dela Rosa posted a video on Facebook calling on the public to come out and prevent his arrest and extradition to The Hague. "Do not allow another Filipino to be taken to The Hague," he said. The Senate president ordered the lights turned off and instructed everyone to keep a low profile, declaring the Senate was "seemingly under attack." A Senate official subsequently told reporters there were no casualties and everyone was safe.
