Senator Koko Pimentel called on President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to reconsider the country’s decision to withdraw from the International Criminal Court and rejoin the international body.
Pimentel made this appeal during a recent foreign policy address at the Department of Foreign Affairs.
Rejoining the ICC would act as an “insurance policy” against potential abuses of power by future leaders and failures in the justice system, according to the former Senate President.
“Let us rejoin the ICC. We should treat this as our ‘insurance policy’ just in case ‘our system’ fails us and we get to elect an abusive, tyrannical, heartless leader, and our justice system fails us too,” he said said in his speech before members of the diplomatic community.
The Philippines withdrew from the ICC in 2019 after the Hague-based court announced an investigation into the Duterte administration’s war on drugs.
Pimentel emphasized the rejoining the ICC is an executive action and called on Marcos Jr. to sign the necessary documents to reenter the ICC.
“We are monitoring the Quad Com, and here in the Senate, we also have an investigation. We’ve seen that in the worst-case scenario where our systems fail, such as when our democratic system elects a killer as a leader, one without conscience or compassion, and our justice system is slow to respond. In those events, it’s best to have an ‘insurance policy,'” he told reporters.IMT
