Rodrigo Duterte

Announcement follows multiple impeachment complaints against the vice president over allegations of corruption.

Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte has said she intends to run for president in the upcoming 2028 election, following in the footsteps of her notorious father, ex-President Rodrigo Duterte, who is currently on trial at the International Criminal Court (ICC) for crimes against humanity.

“It took me 47 years to understand that my life was never meant to be only mine,” Sara Duterte said on Wednesday.

“For a long time, I questioned the weight of responsibility to my family, to my country, to everyone who called on me,” Duterte said in a livestreamed address.

“I am Sara Duterte, and I am running for president in the Philippines,” she said.

Duterte also asked her followers for their “forgiveness” over her previous support for incumbent President Ferdinand Marcos Jr during the last presidential election.

The Philippines continues to struggle with rampant problems, from corruption to poverty and a cost-of-living crisis, she said.

“I cannot kneel before each and every Filipino to beg for forgiveness. Instead, I offer my life, my strength, and my future in the service of our nation,” she added.

Despite throwing her support behind Marcos’s election bid five years ago, Duterte and the president have since become bitter rivals, particularly following the launch of a corruption inquiry in 2024 into Duterte’s misuse of government funds.

Their relationship then soured further last year when Marcos signed off on the arrest of her father by the Philippine National Police and Interpol, acting on behalf of the ICC.

Duterte’s candidacy announcement comes during a difficult week for the vice president and her family. She is facing multiple impeachment complaints in the House of Representatives for alleged corruption and making a death threat against President Marcos.

Her father is also due to receive the confirmation of charges against him in The Hague, where he is accused of committing crimes against humanity as part of his so-called “war on drugs” while president of the Philippines between 2016 and 2022.

Cleve Arguelles, political scientist and CEO of the public opinion company WR Numero Research, said her father’s trial in The Hague has raised the stakes for the vice president and her family.

Arguelles said the announcement was likely designed to “freeze panic inside” her political faction “before it prematurely unravels”.

“When legal risk rises, so does the temptation to defect early to save one’s own skin,” Arguelles said.

“When the boat starts taking in water, some passengers look for lifeboats; others start pushing people overboard,” he said.

Former Philippine justice secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II also among eight current, past officials named in complaint.

Two sitting Philippine senators have been identified as “co-perpetrators” in former president Rodrigo Duterte‘s crimes against humanity trial at the International Criminal Court (ICC), documents released by prosecutors show.

Senators Ronald “Bato” Dela Rosa and Christopher “Bong” Go are among eight current and former officials named in a document dated February 13 and posted to the court’s website late on Friday.

Duterte was arrested in the Philippines’ capital, Manila, in March 2025, and was swiftly flown to the Netherlands, where he has been held in ICC custody at The Hague. The 80-year-old insists his arrest was unlawful.

ICC prosecutors have charged him with three counts of crimes against humanity, alleging his involvement in at least 76 murders as part of his “war on drugs”.

“Duterte and his co-perpetrators shared a common plan or agreement to ‘neutralise’ alleged criminals in the Philippines [including those perceived or alleged to be associated with drug use, sale or production] through violent crimes including murder,” the prosecution document reads.

Dela Rosa, the former national police chief and enforcer of Duterte’s drug war, has previously said he believed he faced potential arrest and has been in hiding for months.

Go, re-elected in May in a landslide victory, was a key lieutenant of Duterte during both the latter’s terms as mayor of southern Davao City and as president from 2016 to 2022.

A representative of Dela Rosa said they had not yet seen the document. Go has yet to comment on the latest development.

It was not immediately clear if any of the men named in the prosecution document would face charges in court.

In a statement posted on Facebook, Kristina Conti, lawyer of several of the deceased victims’ families, noted that it’s the first time “significant details” were disclosed by the ICC to the public.

She said the inclusion of several high-ranking officials under Duterte showed that the deadly drug war under his presidency “was crafted not only to ensure implementation, but to ensure impunity”.

“The involvement of those in the investigating units, which should have acted as the killings happen, is material to the plan. This also emphasizes that the ‘war on drugs’ began in Davao,” Conti said.

Duterte is facing a four-day “confirmation of charges” hearing from February 23, in which judges will decide whether the prosecution’s allegations are strong enough to proceed to trial.

Judges have rejected arguments that the 80-year-old, who was arrested in March last year and transferred to the Netherlands the same day, was unfit to stand trial.

Go and Dela Rosa have been named as co-perpetrators in acts that took place during Duterte’s tenures as Davao mayor and president.

Former Philippine justice secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II, who served as a lawyer for Duterte in cases involving the so-called “Davao Death Squad”, is also among the eight men named.

Ross Tugade, an ICC-accredited lawyer from the Philippines, said in a post on Facebook that the inclusion of the names of former Duterte officials indicates “that the ICC has evidence” to show a “criminal structure” in the commission of the alleged crimes.

The first of three counts against Duterte concerns his alleged involvement as a co-perpetrator in 19 murders carried out between 2013 and 2016 while he was mayor of Davao City.

The second relates to 14 murders of so-called “High Value Targets” in 2016 and 2017 when Duterte was president.

The third charge covers 43 murders committed during “clearance” operations of lower-level alleged drug users or pushers.

These took place across the Philippines between 2016 and 2018, the prosecution alleged.

The ICC also on Friday allowed the addition of 500 more complainants against Duterte in the trial.