Duterte 'certain' De Lima will face jail time over drug-related cases

PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte said Monday that his staunchest critic, Senator Leila de Lima, would be imprisoned for her alleged involvement in illegal drug trade at the New Bilibid Prison (NBP).

Speaking before the officials and members of Malacañang Press Corps, Malacañang Cameramen Association, and Presidential Photographers Association, the President said "plenty" of drug-related cases would be filed against De Lima.

"She (De Lima) will really get imprisoned. That's certain because of testimonial evidence," Duterte said.

"Who brought in the narco-politics? It is here already [because] you elected a senator who was in narco-politics, who was being financed by the inside, inside the prison," he added.

The 71-year-old chief executive, in a so-called Bilibid drug matrix, has tagged De Lima as the top official who had participated in the illegal drug operations inside the national penitentiary.

The senator has denied the allegations.

Duterte and De Lima's rift started when the latter had linked him to the vigilante group Davao Death Squad when she was the chairperson of the Commission on Human Rights.

De Lima even presented in a Senate inquiry self-confessed hitman Edgar Motabato who claimed that the President ordered the killings in Davao City when he was the mayor.

Duterte, however, maintained that he had no hands in the supposed summary execution in the southern city and described the senator's claim as "garbage."

"De Lima is diverting the issue. [The allegation of] Matobato is not true," the President said.

"The report you'll get would be garbage coming from De Lima," he added. (Sunnex)

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