So what happened to the pronouncements of the tough-talking President Rodrigo Duterte?

This was how Senator Leila de Lima taunted Duterte on Monday after he reportedly admitted the existence of extrajudicial killings in the country except that they were not state-sponsored.

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“So ngayon iba na, iba na yung kanyang sinasabi (Now, he is flip-flopping). Akala ko ba the (I thought) buck stops with him? Akala ko ba sya (I thought) he will be solely responsible for that? And in fact, magbibigay pa sya ng pardon sa mga (he would give pardon to) policemen who may be charged,” de Lima told reporters.

“So ano naman yan (What now)? Paiba-iba (He’s flip-flopping). Dati ang tapang-tapang na ganun ang sinasabi, na (Before he was so brave in saying those things, that) he’s willing to die for the Philippines, for the Filipinos basta ba ma-achieve nya yung gusto nya na yung (to achieve his goal of) eradicating the drug menace through that approach.”

“So I don’t know, nagsalita na kasi yung ICC e (the ICC has spoken) and I’ve been warning about him on that. See? O di ba, e sineseryoso dapat yung mga ganyang bagay, hindi yung natatapang-tapangan tapos only in the end babawiin, babawiin yung tapang (Those things should be taken seriously, [Duterte] shoud not be acting so brave only to revoke his statements in the end),” the senator added.

De Lima was apparently referring to the statement of International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor Fatou Bensouda that her office would start to closely monitor the developments in the Philippines as she raised concerns over alleged extrajudicial killings (EJKs) that “may have led to over 3,000 deaths in the past three months.”

“My Office, in accordance with its mandate under the Rome Statute, will be closely following developments in the Philippines in the weeks to come and record any instance of incitement or resort to violence with a view to assessing whether a preliminary examination into the situation of the Philippines needs to be opened,” Bensouda said.

While admitting that there were cases of EJKs in the country, Duterte denied that it was state-sponsored or that he ordered the killings.

“Alam mo, huwag tayo magbolahan, ‘yung iba talaga diyan pinatay talaga—salvage. ‘Yan ang tinatawag na salvage o extra-judicial killing (Let’s not fool ourselves here. Some of the killings were salvage or extra-judicial killing). I will not say there was none, meron (there are cases like that),” the President was quoted as saying in the media.

“Pero kung sabihin mo na state-sponsored killing, order ko na patayin ‘yan, kalokohan ‘yan (But if you would say that these are state-sponsored killings, that I ordered them killed, that’s foolish),” Duterte added. RAM/rga

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