UK Filipinos divided over Duterte arrest

Activist Myra Lucero in London. 18 March 2025. Credit: Author.

When news broke of former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte’s arrest on 11 March, accused of crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court (ICC), Filipino Myra Lucero wept. To supporters, Duterte’s detention was a sudden violation of his civil rights. To Lucero, this was a long time coming.

“I couldn't even stand up, I was just lying in bed crying because this is like eight years,” she said. “This is not justice yet, not yet, but to have him locked in The Hague will provide a clearer way to move forward for the victims who are still scared just seeing him.”

Activists Myra Lucero and Christ Godino in London. 18 March 2025. Credit: Author.

For nearly a decade, Lucero has helped build the case against Duterte, encouraging testimonies from families of those killed in his bloody “war on drugs” that human rights groups estimate killed more than 30,000 civilians.

Lucero moved to London in 2003. Concerned for her safety, she has not been back to the Philippines since 2016, the year Duterte came to power, “I'm already known to speak up, I've been targeted.”

“To protect my family, I had to unfriend everybody,” she said. “I had to move my family, move them out totally, everybody, including the children, to safety.”

When the ICC privately issued Duterte’s arrest warrant on 7 March, four days before the world knew, Lucero kept quiet so as not to disturb a “precarious time”. When he was arrested, she did not celebrate publicly, afraid of local backlash.

Pro-Duterte rally in Marble Arch. 16 March 2025. Credit: Author.

Support for Duterte

Other Filipinos in the UK, like care worker Amlan, also cried over Duterte’s arrest but for very different reasons. “I've been sleepless for two nights, honestly, because he doesn't deserve this,” Amlan said at a prayer vigil days after Duterte arrived in The Hague, travelling to London after finishing her care home shift in St. Albans.

“We are not here for violence, no, this is the man that we believe in.” She denied the brutal allegations against him. “It's definitely not Duterte, no. You wouldn't see millions of Filipinos and people protecting him, praying for him like this.”

Nanay Jessie at a prayer vigil outside the Philippine embassy in London. 15 March 2025. Credit: Author.

Duterte, praised for his tough stance on criminality, continues to receive widespread support from overseas Filipinos. Since his arrest, crowds of Filipinos have gathered outside London’s Philippine embassy into the night, singing, weeping and praying together over “Rody” or “Tatay (Papa) Digong”. Hundreds demonstrated in London's Marble Arch calling for his release.

Care worker Dona Dayot said Duterte’s brutal drug war was necessary. “I am on that side where lives have been ruined… because we get addicts in the family. So let's just say 30,000 [deaths]? How many millions of people are there in the Philippines?”

The Punisher

On 11 March, 79-year-old Duterte was taken into police custody at Manila’s international airport after arriving from Hong Kong and extradited to The Hague. He is due to stand trial in September against charges of crimes against humanity for extrajudicial killings committed during and before his 2016 to 2022 presidency.Accusations are limited between November 2011 to March 2019, when Duterte withdrew the Philippines from ICC’s founding Rome Statute.

Nicknamed “The Punisher”, allegations reference Duterte’s brutal “war on drugs” that explicitly targeted suspected drug dealers and addicts. At a presidential campaign rally, Duterte said "Forget the laws on human rights. If I make it to the presidential palace, I will do just what I did as mayor. You drug pushers, hold-up men and do-nothings, you better go out. Because I'd kill you."

Human rights activist Christ Godino in London. 18 March 2025. Credit: Author.

"I believe in the Filipino people”

Christ Godino, an activist with Migrantes UK, said the 2017 murder of 17-year-old student Kian delos Santos during an anti-drug operation turned him into an activist.

Santos was closing his family’s small food store in Caloocan City, the city where Godino was born, when three police officers dragged him into an alleyway and shot him. According to an eyewitness, his last words were “Please stop. Please stop. I have a test tomorrow.” Santos’ case made Godino, “think of my future in the country where I could be targeted for just anything.”

To Godino, Duterte’s arrest is an opportunity for justice, “there's a continued fight so the Filipino people could really experience a just peace, a lasting, a society where they're free from violence,” he said. “I believe in the Filipino people.”