De Lima, who faces an ethics probe at the Senate, also chose to ignore the latest broadside from President Duterte, saying, “I’ll let the people judge me.”
She reiterated she would not attend the inquiry to be conducted by the House of Representatives on the alleged proliferation of drugs at the New Bilibid Prison (NBP) when she was the secretary of justice.
“I initiated (drug raids at the NBP) so why will they investigate me? I found a way to expose the drug problems there. Don’t they know that I exerted certain efforts, steps after discovering all of those inside Bilibid?” she said.
She also branded as unfair Duterte’s allegations that she benefited from prosecuting lawmakers in the multibillion-peso pork barrel scam by alleged mastermind Janet Lim-Napoles.
Duterte on Tuesday tagged De Lima as the protector of drug lords operating in the NBP.
Senate Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III said a complaint was filed against De Lima on Monday by a private citizen. The complaint will be tackled by the chamber’s ethics committee, which he chairs.
He did not give details on the complaint except that it was connected to allegations that De Lima was linked to drug lords operating from the NBP.
Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano told reporters he would ask De Lima to inhibit from presiding over the inquiry on extrajudicial killings led by the Senate committee on justice, which she chairs.
He said by her own definition, the extrajudicial killings are incidents condoned and/or unacted upon by the state. He said the Duterte administration has condemned extrajudicial killings and has been conducting investigations on the same.
De Lima dismissed the call of Cayetano, who she said was the one who’s biased, being “the defender and apologist” of Duterte.
“Why should I (inhibit)?” she said.
Source: philstar
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