In the Philippines, it is perfectly normal for a sitting president to go after a predecessor to raise his or her stature.
Gloria Macapagal Arroyo went after Joseph Estrada after the latter was removed from power and tried him for plunder before the anti-graft Sandiganbayan court.
After Estrada’s conviction, she pardoned him, allowing him to run again in an election in 2010 in which he nearly won for the second time as president.
In 2010, Arroyo faced some criminal charges after the Aquino administration accused her of election fraud and corruption.
She was under hospital arrest for almost six years, wearing a neck brace to justify her hospitalization.
Arroyo was never convicted. Aquino’s successor freed her.
Aquino never faced any criminal or civil complaint but died a year before Rodrigo Duterte completed his single six-year term under the 1987 Constitution.
Duterte may escape prosecution in the local courts, but he faces complaints for crimes against humanity before the International Criminal Court (ICC).
There is some chance the sitting president, Ferdinand Marcos Jr., may feed Duterte to the lions. The ex-leader has been trying to tarnish Marcos Jr.’s reputation.
Duterte has described Marcos Jr. as a drug user, without any proof or basis. However, he told the public he had seen the president’s name among drug users in one of the reports from the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA).
The PDEA denied Duterte’s tales. The Philippine National Police (PNP) also refuted Duterte’s assertion.
Even Sen. Ronaldo dela Rosa, a former PNP chief and a close ally of former president Duterte, dismissed the accusations.
Was Duterte making up stories to accuse the president? There were indeed urban legends about Marcos Jr.’s cocaine use, but there was no evidence to prove that.
Marcos Jr. fought back, saying the former president has been using a regulated pain reliever called Fentanyl. Duterte had admitted to his Fentanyl use, sometimes taking too much that he felt he was on cloud nine.
Duterte has started attacking his successor after his daughter, Vice President Sara Duterte-Carpio, lost 650 million pesos in confidential and intelligence funds under the 2024 budget.
Speculating that the president was behind moves to get his daughter out of the way in the 2028 elections, Duterte’s tirades against Marcos intensified.
He has been reported as behind moves to oust the president through a coup, agitating soldiers through some ex-generals to take action to supposedly save the Republic.
Duterte has accused the president of secretly encouraging his cousin, Speaker Ferdinand Martin Romualdez, to change the 1987 Constitution to marginalize the Duterte family.
Duterte is getting desperate. He even threatened to lead a movement to set up an independent Mindanao, separating from the Republic, a proposal that other leaders from Mindanao opposed.
Fears of an impending arrest from the ICC further fueled Duterte’s paranoia.
Duterte’s son joined the fray, calling on the president to resign in a speech late last month.
Marcos Jr. appeared conciliatory, treating Duterte’s daughter as a close ally even if the “uni-team” that brought them together to power in the 2022 elections seemed to be breaking apart.
But it was apparent Marcos Jr.’s wife, First Lady Lisa Araneta-Marcos, was not seeing eye-to-eye with Sara and her close friend, Sen. Imee Marcos, her sister-in-law.
If Marcos Jr.’s relations with Duterte deteriorate in the months ahead, it may affect ties with the vice president.
There had been many precedents when vice presidents quarreled with the president, starting with the late Salvador Laurel when he criticized Corazon Aquino.
Filipinos were also familiar with Arroyo taking a stand against Estrada.
Jejomar Binay later criticized Aquino when the latter endorsed Mar Roxas in the 2016 elections.
Duterte also mistreated his vice president, Maria Leonor Robredo, who came from the opposition party.
It will not be long before Marcos Jr. openly opposes Duterte, including his daughter, the vice president.
As Duterte fades into oblivion, he loses his influence on Congress, the military, and the people.
A desperate Duterte may be a dangerous man. But with power in the hands of Marcos Jr., the ex-president may just become a paper tiger.