Dozens arrested and hurt in clashes with police near Philippine
presidential palace
[September 22, 2025]
By JIM GOMEZ, JOEAL CALUPITAN and AARON FAVILA
MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Philippine police arrested 49 people
suspected of hurling rocks, bottles and fire bombs at officers and
blocking heavily guarded roads and bridges leading to the presidential
palace Sunday while a peaceful anti-corruption rally took place in the
capital, officials and witnesses said.
The melee outside the country’s seat of power unfolded while more than
33,000 other protesters rallied in a historic park and a democracy
monument in Manila. They expressed outrage over a corruption scandal
involving lawmakers, officials and construction company owners who
allegedly pocketed huge kickbacks from flood-control projects in the
impoverished Southeast Asian country that is regularly buffeted by
storms and typhoons.
The hourslong rampage by about 100 mostly club-wielding people, some of
whom waved Philippine flags and displayed carton posters with
anti-corruption slogans, wounded about 70 Manila law enforcers,
according to the Manila police. Schools were canceled due to the
violence.
Police said they lobbed tear gas to try to disperse the attackers, who
sprayed graffiti on walls, toppled steel posts, shattered glass panels
and ransacked the lobby of a budget inn along a popular road dotted with
university campuses, banks and restaurants before dispersing at night.
Hours after the assault, police have yet to identify the attackers, some
of whom carried black flags with the caricature of a skull and
crossbones. It was also unclear if they had earlier participated in the
peaceful protests before heading toward the presidential office. It was
not immediately known if President Marcos Jr. was in the Malacanang
presidential palace during the chaos.
Police said in a statement after the arrests that the situation was
“contained” but warned that violence and vandalism would not be
tolerated.
Protesting corruption
“I feel bad that we wallow in poverty and we lose our homes, our lives
and our future while they rake in a big fortune from our taxes that pay
for their luxury cars, foreign trips and bigger corporate transactions,”
student activist Althea Trinidad told The Associated Press in Manila.
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A protester hits police during a scuffle as they tried to enter the
Malacanang palace compound in Manila, Philippines on Sunday, Sept.
21, 2025. (AP Photo/Aaron Favila)
Trinidad lives in Bulacan, a flood-prone province north of Manila
where officials said the most flood-control projects were being
investigated either as substandard or nonexistent.
“Our purpose is not to destabilize but to strengthen our democracy,”
Cardinal Pablo Virgilio David, the head of the Catholic Bishops’
Conference of the Philippines, said in a statement. He called on the
public to demonstrate peacefully and demand accountability.
Marcos first highlighted the flood-control corruption scandal in
July in his annual state of the nation speech.
He later established an independent commission to investigate what
he said were anomalies in many of the 9,855 flood-control projects
worth more than 545 billion pesos ($9.5 billion) that were supposed
to have been undertaken since he took office in mid-2022. He called
the scale of corruption “horrible” and accepted his public works
secretary's resignation.
Public outrage erupted when a wealthy couple who ran several
construction companies that won lucrative flood-control project
contracts showed dozens of European and American luxury cars they
owned during media interviews. The fleet included a British luxury
car costing 42 million pesos ($737,000) that they said they bought
because it came with a free umbrella.
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