The powerful Duterte dynasty will begin to feel the crippling absence of its leaders as their crucial battle for political survival unfolds.
As the local campaign starts, the powerful Duterte dynasty will begin to feel the crippling absence of its leaders as their crucial battle for political survival unfolds.
Former President Rodrigo Duterte, who is seeking to retake Davao City’s mayoral seat, will miss the campaign trail as he languishes in Scheveningen Prison in The Hague, the Netherlands, while awaiting the next stage of his case before the International Criminal Court (ICC) for murder as a crime against humanity.
His arrest on March 11, through a warrant from the ICC served by the International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol), was linked to the thousands of deaths from his brutal war on drugs from 2011 to 2019, during his terms as Davao City mayor and president of the Philippines.
READ: Rodrigo Duterte marks 80th birthday in ICC detention
The only public event when Duterte made a pitch for his mayoral bid and that of son Sebastian’s candidacy for vice mayor was during a gift-giving activity in December last year at their ancestral home here.
During that time, he asked his supporters not to abandon their family as “we have not done you any wrong.”
The former president’s eldest son, Davao City Rep. Paolo Duterte of the first district, who is running for reelection, is widely expected to be in The Hague in time for their patriarch’s 80th birthday on March 28.
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His sisters, Vice President Sara Duterte and Veronica Duterte, the former president’s daughter with partner Honeylet Avanceña, are already in the Netherlands.
