Bato’s escape run an ignominy

This was written before the seemingly scripted fracas that erupted on Wednesday at the Senate where gunshots rang out.

It was straight out of a “Tom and Jerry” cartoon flick, showing Sen. Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa scampering up the stairway leading to the Senate premises to evade National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) agents chasing him to serve the arrest warrant for crimes against humanity from the International Criminal Court (ICC). The burly former Philippine National Police chief fled from his pursuers, stumbled and fell, rose and ran until he reached the GSIS building’s Senate premises, where he adamantly declared himself immune from arrest while under the Senate’s “protective custody.”

The video of the pursuit has been played again and again on social media with commentaries. One—posted perhaps by an opera buff—had background music from Rossini’s famous “William Tell Overture.” With trumpets blaring and all, I thought it was so funny, if not pathetic.

I’ve always loved watching movies about daring escapes, like “The Great Escape,” “The Fugitive,” “Papillon,” and “The Shawshank Redemption,” to name a few. What’s your fave? Bato’s daring dash belongs to the T and J genre.

To avoid arrest, the former PNP head and chief enforcer of former President Rodrigo Duterte’s brutal war on drugs and alleged extrajudicial killings had been absent in the Senate for some six months but was receiving his salary. (The arrest warrant was dated Nov. 6, 2025, it turned out.) He suddenly surfaced last Monday to participate in the ousting of Senate President Vicente “Tito” Sotto III who was replaced by Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano. This was also the day that the House of Representatives gave a majority yes vote to the articles of impeachment against Vice President Sara Duterte, which is Senate-bound for trial. What gives?

Had the NBI agents succeeded in arresting Bato, he would have been flown to the Scheveningen prison in The Hague in the Netherlands, where Rodrigo Duterte, his former boss, is detained, soon to be tried for crimes against humanity.

Bato’s daring dash ended in ignominy, if I may say so. But for failing to serve the warrant and put him in handcuffs on the first try, the NBI pursuers should take some of the onus. But I am still laughing at the catch-me-if-you-can scenario and, later, his loud fulminations about his immunity from arrest whenever the Senate is in session, something legal experts say is simply based on the tradition of “due respect” and without legal basis.

The word ignominy means disgrace, humiliation, public shame, embarrassment—and in the case of Bato, resulting from an act not quite proportionate to one’s stature. The adjective is ignominious, as in ignominious defeat. In Filipino, kahiya-hiya.

Former Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV, who was with the arresting team, showed a copy of the arrest warrant. What was he doing there? His answer: Bato, months ago, had challenged him to be there when the arrest warrant would be served. “Make my day,” Bato had thundered with the “Dirty Harry” line. Taking up the challenge, Trillanes showed up and debunked Bato’s line that he was immune from arrest.

Trillanes recalled that in 2018, when he was served a warrant of arrest (for rebellion) in the Senate, he went with the arresting team without fuss or fanfare. So did former senator, now Mamamayang Liberal party list Rep. Leila de Lima who had languished in solitary confinement in prison for almost seven years—with trumped-up charges orchestrated by the vengeful Duterte—before she was acquitted in 2024.

Recall, too, former Sen. Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr., walking calmly with arresting officers, descending the airplane stairs and being gunned down before he could step on Philippine soil. No protestations, just quiet dignity before martyrdom. Aug. 21, 1983, remember?

But recall, too, how, after weeks of search, Brig. Gen. Nicolas Torre (later PNP chief) extricated “appointed Son of God” Apollo Quiboloy, accused of sex abuse of minors, spiritual adviser of Duterte, from a tunnel in his hillside paradise. And how Torre carried out the arrest of the former president and got him on a waiting plane that would fly him to The Hague. “It was a mind game,” said Torre, who now heads the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority.

Bato, being chased, running, and stumbling at that, to evade arrest is cinematic, but in his case, it belongs in the laff-in department. Not to jeer at his self-preservation efforts, but the video is indeed one for constant replay.

Inquirer’s banner story two days ago was headlined, “Alan: Only PH court warrant can get Bato.” Now Bato is pleading with President Marcos to please save him from being flown to The Hague and to instead be tried in his own country. But experts say that the government is duty-bound to surrender a person to a requesting international court. Also, Bato cannot invoke Senate protection because the crime he is accused of is punishable by more than six years in prison. If found guilty, he could face a maximum of 30 years imprisonment in the land of windmills, where tulips grow in abundance.

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