On a humid March morning in Manila, a scene unfolded that would reverberate through Philippine politics for months to come. Former President Rodrigo Duterte, the tough-talking architect of the country’s controversial anti-drug campaign, was arrested by authorities under an International Criminal Court (ICC) warrant. The operation, carried out on March 11, 2025, was anything but routine. Police reports described chaos: Duterte refused fingerprinting, threatened lawsuits, and resisted being taken into custody. Yet, despite the drama, he was ultimately flown aboard a Gulfstream G550 jet from Villamor Airbase to The Hague, Netherlands—making him the first Asian head of state to end up in ICC custody, according to SunStar.
The charges? Alleged crimes against humanity linked to a bloody anti-drug crusade that spanned his years as both Davao City mayor and Philippine president, from 2011 to 2019. Human rights groups like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch quickly hailed the arrest as “historic” and a “monumental step for victims of the drug war.” But for Duterte’s supporters, the event was a deep betrayal. Vice President Sara Duterte, his daughter, condemned the government’s actions as “a blatant affront to our sovereignty and an insult to every Filipino.”
The fallout was immediate. On September 15, 2025, acting Davao City Mayor Sebastian “Baste” Duterte—another of Duterte’s children—filed a sweeping 160-page criminal and administrative complaint with the Office of the Ombudsman-Mindanao. The complaint, detailed in SunStar and the Philippine Daily Inquirer, accused eleven top government and police officials of conspiring in the arrest and transfer of the former president. The list of respondents reads like a who’s who of the Philippine security and justice establishment: Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla, Interior Secretary Jonvic Remulla, Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro, National Security Adviser Eduardo Año, former Philippine National Police (PNP) chiefs Rommel Marbil and Nicolas Torre III, and several others, including senior prosecutors and special envoys.
Mayor Duterte’s complaint alleges a litany of crimes: kidnapping, arbitrary detention, violating the rights of arrested persons, qualified direct assault, expulsion, usurpation of judicial functions, and violations of both the Anti-Torture Act and the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act. The document also levels administrative charges for serious dishonesty, gross neglect of duty, and disloyalty to the Republic. Even the pilots and owner of the aircraft that ferried Duterte to The Hague were named in the case.
What’s at the heart of these accusations? According to the complaint, the arrest and transfer were illegal because no Philippine court ever issued a warrant. Mayor Duterte argues that the top officials worked directly with the ICC and Interpol to enforce what he calls an “illegal implementation” of a foreign order. He claims that his father was denied legal counsel and medical care, and that authorities concealed the elder Duterte’s whereabouts during the operation. The charges paint a picture of a government willing to bend—or break—its own laws to please international actors.
Yet, the government’s defense has been unwavering. Justice Secretary Remulla dismissed the complaint as “forum shopping,” suggesting that Mayor Duterte’s legal team was simply trying to block his own application for Ombudsman. In a televised interview, Interior Secretary Jonvic Remulla called the complaint “pure political harassment,” telling ANC’s Headstart, “I think the Ombudsman, the current acting Ombudsman, will hopefully see that this is just pure political harassment. I don’t think it’s stopped since March. I think everything is fair game to them. But, it’s okay. We will face the charges. Whatever they file, we will answer. I think we are confident with what we did and how we accomplished it.”
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has also stood firmly by the operation, saying authorities “followed proper and legal procedures.” He has argued that the Philippines’ withdrawal from the Rome Statute in 2019 did not erase the ICC’s jurisdiction over alleged crimes committed while the country was still a member. “It was part of the Philippines’ commitment to the International Criminal Police Organization,” Marcos said at a press conference, as reported by the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
The legal drama is not the only front in this battle. The arrest and transfer have deepened the rift between the Marcos and Duterte camps, fueling protests in Mindanao and Manila and sparking a deluge of social media disinformation and propaganda. Human rights advocates, meanwhile, see the ICC proceedings as a test of whether even former heads of state can be held accountable for grave abuses.
Inside The Hague, the proceedings have taken a dramatic turn. Since his transfer, Duterte’s lawyers have filed petitions questioning his fitness to stand trial, citing medical reports of memory loss and cognitive decline. On August 18, 2025, the defense formally requested that the ICC declare Duterte unfit to stand trial due to “cognitive impairment in multiple domains.” The ICC pre-trial chamber, which was initially set to confirm charges on September 23, 2025, postponed the hearing to review these medical claims.
Vice President Sara Duterte, in a chance interview on September 16, 2025, disclosed she had spoken with her father just days earlier. “Last Friday, he called. He’s OK. We talked about politics. We talked about flood control. We talked about his love life,” she told reporters, as cited by Manila Bulletin. However, she declined to comment on whether he was mentally fit to stand trial, saying, “I am not an expert to determine the capacity of a witness, of an accused.” She added, “I think there will be a hearing on the competency so let’s just wait for the experts from both sides, the ICC, the prosecution, the defense side. I am sure the experts will be able to tell what is the problem.”
Joel Butuyan, president of the Center for International Law, was blunt in his criticism of the defense’s medical claims. He described the filing as a “baseless move to secure an interim release from the ICC,” arguing that Duterte’s legal team was simply trying to delay the proceedings after previous motions had been denied.
Meanwhile, Sara Duterte has been active on the political scene, planning trips to Tokyo and Nagoya on September 20 and 21, 2025, for Filipino community gatherings in support of the campaign to free her father. She’s also scheduled meetings with senators in Manila, though she declined to name whom she intends to see, saying, “I will not mention the name as it may delay me. I am in a hurry. There is only one.”
As the Ombudsman weighs whether to pursue Mayor Duterte’s complaint—and as the ICC deliberates on the former president’s fitness to stand trial—the Philippines finds itself at a crossroads. The outcome of these legal battles could put some of the nation’s highest officials on trial and shape the country’s standing on the international stage for years to come. For now, the Duterte-ICC saga remains one of the most consequential and contentious chapters in recent Philippine history, with the rule of law, political loyalty, and questions of justice all hanging in the balance.
