Duterte critic is held on bribes charges

Philippine senator accused of taking drug lord money

MANILA // A senator who has been a leading critic of Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte’s deadly anti- drug campaign was arrested on bribes charges yesterday.

Leila de Lima professed her innocence and said she would not be intimidated by a leader she has described as a “serial killer”.

Ms de Lima was arrested a day after the regional trial court in Muntinlupa city in the Manila metropolis issued the warrant for her and other officials who have been charged by state prosecutors for taking bribes from detained drug lords.

Ms de Lima said the charges against her were part of an attempt by Mr Duterte to silence critics of the violent operations that have killed more than 7,000 suspected drug dealers and small-time users.

Prosecutors allege that Ms de Lima, while she was justice secretary, received bribes from drug lords to finance her senatorial campaign. They said some of the drug lords would testify against her.

The bribes were allegedly solicited by her former driver and lover, who was also charged and arrested on Thursday.

She asked why the court suddenly issued the arrest order when it was scheduled yesterday to hear her petition to rule the three non-bailable charges void.

“If they think they can silence me. If they think I will no longer fight for my advocacies, especially on the truth on the daily killings and other intimidations of this Duterte regime, it’s my honour to be jailed for what I’ve been fighting for,” she said before police took her into custody.

Presidential spokesman Ernesto Abella said Ms de Lima would be treated fairly and should not fear for her safety where she was detained.

When she headed the government’s commission on human rights, she tried unsuccessfully to have Mr Duterte prosecuted when he was mayor of Davao city for allegedly unlawful deaths in his anti-drug crackdown in the city. No witnesses came forward then to testify against him.

Mr Duterte has lashed out at Ms de Lima with foul language, calling her a sex- crazed, immoral woman whose election opened “the portals of the national government to narco politics”.

In one of her strongest statements against the president this week, Ms de Lima called Mr Duterte a “sociopathic serial killer” who has not been made to answer for more than 1,000 deaths during his tenure in Davao city and now for the thousands of deaths in his national fight against illegal drugs.

She urged Mr Duterte’s cabinet members to declare him unfit to serve as the country’s president.

Justice secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II warned that such remarks were seditious, but Ms de Lima replied that Mr Aguirre and Mr Duterte were “the rebels and inciters against a constitutional order that values life and due process above everything else”.