Bato goes ballistic, says ‘one death is too many’ for drug war
MANILA, Philippines — Sen. Ronald "Bato" dela Rosa, who once dismissed the killing of a three-year-old girl in a police operation with “shit happens”, now says that even one death is too high a price to pay for the war on drugs.
A combative Dela Rosa defended the controversial drug war following former President Rodrigo Duterte’s arrest by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for crimes against humanity.
As Duterte’s former police chief, Dela Rosa oversaw the brutal anti-drug campaign, which saw thousands killed.
While government records estimate around 6,000 deaths, human rights groups say the real toll could be as high as 30,000.
Speaking on ANC’s Dateline Philippines, Dela Rosa became defensive when asked about families of drug war victims struggling to obtain police reports or death certificates.
He brushed off the reports as “propaganda," despite extensive media documentation of families whose relatives were killed in police operations without proper case resolution.
“‘Wag na! That’s plain bullshit! That’s plain propaganda!” Dela Rosa shouted during the interview.
When told to watch his language, he refused to back down, challenging critics to file individual cases rather than broadly labeling the deaths as extrajudicial killings (EJKs).
‘One death is too many’
Despite his outburst, Dela Rosa claimed he was not an advocate of death.
“My God, I am a professional policeman. One death is too many. One death is too many para sa akin,” he said.
But as PNP chief from 2016 to 2018, Dela Rosa presided over a bloody campaign where deaths mounted rapidly. Within just a few months of his appointment, official PNP reports already placed the death toll at over 3,000 by September 2016.
Dela Rosa is among those named in ICC complaints. Former senator Antonio Trillanes, a key ICC petitioner, has said Dela Rosa could be next to receive an arrest warrant.
The senator has already said that he is prepared to join Duterte in The Hague if it comes to that.
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