ROQUE GREETS DE LIMA HAPPY ANNIVERSARY

Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque yesterday mocked calls for the release of Sen. Leila de Lima, who is being held in jail for alleged drug offenses, greeting the senator “happy anniversary” on the first year of her detention.

Roque, former human rights lawyer, said De Lima, who has yet to be tried on charges that she protected drug lords in jail and profited from it as justice secretary, has become the “living symbol” that the Philippines is now a narco state.

International human rights group Amnesty International earlier called on Philippine authorities to release De Lima, saying her continued detention was a violation of due process and her rights.

‘Mother of all’

“She is the mother of all drug lords,” said Roque.

De Lima’s imprisonment, he said, only meant that the Philippine criminal justice system was “alive, effective and working.”

De Lima, who had accused President Duterte of involvement in summary executions as mayor of Davao City, was detained on Feb. 24, 2017. She has repeatedly denied involvement in drugs. Several convicted drug traffickers have been presented by Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre as witnesses to pin down the senator.

Aguirre, responding to De Lima’s supporters including her fellow senators, said the courts were to blame for the delay in the start of De Lima’s trial.

‘Coddler’

The justice secretary said De Lima’s supporters were toeing the line of the European Union and US rights groups that the charges against the senator were trumped up. “De Lima is in jail because she was found preliminarily to be a coddler of drug lords,” said Aguirre.

Aguirre said supporters of De Lima, including senators, should be held in contempt of court for making conclusions ahead of DeLima’s trial, just like Roque concluded that De Lima had been elected into office as a senator because of drug money. De Lima’s election, Roque said, was “funded by drugs.”