Focus on legislation instead of lawyering for detained senator (1)

In a joint statement, three opposition senators, namely, Senators Franklin Drilon, Risa Hontiveros and Kiko Pangilinan, who have mastered the art of finding fault in whatever the President does, and who led the senatorial campaign of the Otso Diretso opposition candidates, who all got clobbered in the polls, and necessarily by force of logic, had themselves likewise been repudiated by the Filipino electorate, issued a joint statement on Senator Leila De Lima’s case.

These are the same senators, together with their detained colleague, who continuously harangue and mock President Rodrigo Roa Duterte at every turn relative to the latter’s official pronouncements on the government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, his war against illegal drugs, corruption, criminality, terrorism and rebellion, as well as his foreign policy on China visa-vis the South China Sea. They also repeatedly accuse him of violating human rights.

They have not learned their lessons from the electoral debacle they have suffered. Nor are they learning from the unprecedented and astronomical trust and approval ratings that PRRD received in the latest survey of Pulse Asia, and the 75 percent approval rating he notched on the way he responded to the health crisis as shown by the recent SWS survey.

This time they have expressed a collective voice in calling for the release of Senator De Lima from detention. An incarceration imposed pursuant to what the law says, as decreed by a competent court hearing her case.

Their joint statement reads:

“Free Senator Leila now: Drilon, Hontiveros, Pangilinan

“The fraudulently concocted evidence against Senator Leila de Lima is crumbling. This will pave the way to her eventual exoneration and long-deserved freedom.

“The testimonies of the financial investigator of AMLC and the digital forensic examiner of PDEA are crucial to the case and should be given weight as these affirm that Sen. De Lima did not conduct suspicious transactions that would link her to illegal drug trade inside the New Bilibid Prison.

“With these statements made in court under oath, the credibility of these two agencies is at stake, thus, their representatives had no reason not to tell the truth.

“Sen. De Lima’s accusers are merely clutching at straws in a desperate attempt to pin her down for a crime she did not commit.

“She has been unjustly detained for over three years, yet she has shown us only courage, hard work and efficiency in continuing her work as a legislator.

“Sen. De Lima deserves her freedom now.”

They claim that the evidence against the detained senator is fraudulently concocted. Really? In the first place, that is not for them to decide; that is for the hearing court to determine. Moreover, the investigating prosecutor found probable cause for her indictment, while the court resolved the validity for the issuance of a warrant for her arrest leading to her detention.

De Lima could have questioned the legality of her incarceration at the onset by filing a petition for bail to compel the prosecution to prove that it has strong evidence that the guilt of the accused is strong. She failed to avail of that legal remedy and opted to stay in jail. Evidently, she wanted to use and milk every ounce of publicity on her detention to peddle the canard that she was being unjustly detained.

Having succeeded in misleading the foreign media and other international human rights groups, including even the gullible US senators who publicly called for her release, she recently filed a motion in court to grant her temporary liberty. Clever.

The opposition senators claim that evidence against De Lima is crumbling. Oh? That is not for them to conclude, isn’t it?

Let us accommodate their fancy and see the basis of their exuberant optimism.

They point to the testimonies of two government witnesses, Artemio Baculi Jr., an AMLC financial investigator, and Krystal Caseñas, a PDEA digital forensic examiner, who testified last Friday ( 23 October 2020) at the Muntinlupa Regional Trial Court, Branch 205, done via teleconference.

Apparently, the three senators were banking on De Lima’s lawyer who evaluated their testimonies and issued a statement after Friday’s hearing that, “From the cell phones allegedly owned by the drug lords, there was nothing whatsoever that indicated that Senator De Lima was part of any drug transaction. That was what became crucial earlier, specially it was the prosecution’s own witnesses who testified to that.”

In an earlier testimony on 22 February 2019, Baguio Mayor Benjamin Magalong, then chief of the Criminal and Investigation and Detection Group, of the Philippine National Police, when the drug charges were filed against De Lima, cleared the senator of any connection to the NBP drug traders. He testified that based on the CIDG intelligence information, it was former BuCor officer-in-charge Rafael Ragos who was “involved in extorting and receiving payola high profile inmates.” The latter was co-accused in the case but had turned prosecution witness against De Lima.

All the foregoing appears to be the factors that moved De Lima’s antiadministration colleagues to issue a self- serving and an illogical joint declaration and flawed demand for the release of the jailed lawmaker.

Let us dissect the senators’ hopeful wish for their unrepentant fellow senator.

“The opposition senators claim that evidence against De Lima is crumbling. Oh? That is not for them to conclude, isn’t it?

(To be continued)

“Nor are they learning from the unprecedented and astronomical trust and approval ratings that PRRD received in the latest survey of Pulse Asia.