Palace: Duterte ‘threat’ of revolutionary war meant for enemies of state

MANILA, Philippines — The threat of President Rodrigo Duterte to declare a revolutionary war was meant as a warning to the enemies of the state, Malacañang said Monday.

Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo said Duterte’s warning “was not made on a whim but brought about by a series of acts committed against the people.

Panelo cited “the bold entry of illegal drugs in the country despite the relentless war against drugs, the unmitigated corruption in the bureaucracy and the outrageous bureaucratic red tape” as the reasons for the hindering of government projects.

He said that these resulted “in delayed services to the people, the seeming impunity of criminals to do their nefarious trade, the onerous contract entered into by the government that prohibited it from performing government action protective of the interest of the people, the NPA’s attacks and ambushes of military and PNP personnel and local government units and their continuing extortion activities, the continuing threat of terrorists that endangers the security of the state and other acts of its enemies that imperil the safety of the nation.”

“The threat, if it is a threat, is not against the people but precisely against their enemies, the criminals, the people manning the illegal drug industry, the corrupt bureaucrats, the greedy politicians, the communist rebels, foreign and local terrorists, and other enemies of the state,” he said in a statement.

He cited Article 2, Section 4 of the Constitution which stated that “the prime duty of the Government is to serve and protect the people.”

“This constitutional command,” he said, “is for the President, as head of government, to serve and protect the people.”

“When the very democratic institutions are being used to the detriment of the people and have become illusory for the people’s interest; when their safety is imperilled, when the territorial integrity is at stake, and when the enemies of the republic are bent on bringing it down, then it becomes the constitutional duty of the President to use the powers reposed to him by the Constitution to quell the attacks on the people and to save the state,” he said.

Panelo, who is also the chief presidential legal counsel of Duterte, said “the Constitution is not without the appropriate provisions he can use to serve and protect the citizenry and the republic.”

“The President’s narrative on the revolutionary war is an expression of frustration and at the same time to put the transgressors of the law and the purveyors of the status quo on notice that he will not sit idly and watch their transgressions unabated and that he will exercise powers the Constitution bestowed him,” he said.

“The Constitution is a living instrument, the dynamics of which cannot be understated, whose framers would have not intended the President to have without recourse in confronting any exigency that places the people’s interest in jeopardy and their safety in mortal danger,” he added.

In a speech last week in Palawan, Duterte warned to suspend the writ of habeas corpus if he is “pushed to the wall.” /je

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