| Home > South-East Asia >> Philippines | |
Davao bombing: Rodrigo Duterte has shown no concern for the rule of law
Sydney Morning Herald - September 3, 2016
Within hours of the attack, Duterte declared a "state of lawlessness", mobilising security forces across his island nation and resembling the dark days of the Marcos dictatorship that ended 30 years ago.
Only days earlier Duterte had assured Filipinos he did not intend to become a dictator as the body count in his shoot-on-sight drugs crackdown topped 2000. "They will say 'he will do a Marcos'... far from it, I am just doing my job," he said.
But the 71-year-old former mayor of Davao has shown no concern about the rule of law as mostly small-time drug pushers and addicts have been shot dead in battles with police or assassinated by unidentified gunmen in carnage that has been condemned by the United Nations and the Catholic Church, among others.
Duerte's declaration of a "state of lawlessness" after the bombing – although falling short of martial law – prompted Amnesty International to warn him not to respond with unlawful killings, arbitrary arrests or other human rights violations, which would only play into the hands of those who seek an ever-widening cycle of violence and abuse.
Duterte has made powerful enemies during his first three months in office, despite his popularity hovering around 90 per cent in the country with one of Asia's highest rates of illegal drug use and crime.
The Islamic State-linked Abu Sayyaf, a brutal group financed by kidnappings-for-ransom, claimed responsibility for Friday's bombing but Duterte said investigators were looking at other possible suspects, including drug syndicates targeted in his crackdown.
Duterte last week ordered his security forces to "kill" all the Abu Sayyaf fighters after a series of gun battles with troops that left dozens dead.
For years the group has carried out bombings, beheadings, assassinations and kidnappings while evading capture in lawless jungles of remote southern Philippine islands.
South-east Asia has entered a potentially dangerous new phase as terrorism festers from Indonesia to the Philippines amid growing concern that Asian jihadists fighting for Islamic State in Syria and Iraq are looking to return home.
In Thailand, a spokesman for southern Muslim insurgents blamed for a series of deadly attacks in Thai tourist areas in August told Al Jazeera television on Friday that separatist fighters were planning more attacks.
Experts in counter-terrorism worry that fighters hardened in Syria and Iraq may have joined the Abu Sayyaf group whose leaders have pledged allegiance to Islamic State in videos as they seek a Philippines caliphate.
See also:
 |