THERE’S no such thing as blood in money.
This was the friendly reminder of Vice President Jejomar Binay to his newfound rival Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte, who hit Binay anew by calling him “berdugo ng pera ng bayan” during a rally in Taguig.
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There is blood, however, in Duterte’s hands for his alleged involvement in the notorious vigilante group Davao Death Squad, Binay said in an interview with reporters in Tangub City, Misamis Occidental on Wednesday.
“Dadagdagan ko lang ito, ha. Dahil sa ang nabasa ko, ang sabi ni Mister Duterte, ako raw ay berdugo ng pera ng mahihirap. Nako, Mister Duterte, unwittingly, lumalabas sa system mo na talagang alam mong berdugo ka,” Binay said.
“Excuse me lang, ha, ang ‘berdugo’ ginagamit lang ‘yon sa pumapatay ng tao. Ang pera, wala namang berdugo ng pera. Wala namang buhay ‘yong pera… Walang blood,” he added, laughing.
Binay said he is not like Duterte who he called the “berdugo” (butcher) of the poor due to the latter’s vigilante group summarily killing alleged criminals who come from the ranks of the poor.
“Paano mo naman sasabihin sa akin na ako ay berdugo ng pera ng mga mahihirap. Pero ikaw, katulad ng iba, ay nagbibintang ka. Abogado ka pa naman. Naging piskal ka pa. Alam mo naman ‘yan. ‘Yang allegations are not evidence. Husgado lamang ang makakapagsabi na may kasalanan ka o wala do’n sa ibinibintang,” Binay said.
The Vice President launched his fiercest attacks against Duterte after the latter took the lead in the latest Social Weather Stations and Pulse Asia surveys where Binay found himself trailing behind.
Binay once praised Duterte as a good candidate for president having years of experience as local government chief executive in Davao City.
But Binay’s admiration for Duterte turned into vilification. He minced no words in urging voters not to vote for Duterte, who he said is a “murderer” and a “butcher” for his alleged links to the Davao Death Squad which killed minors suspected of being criminals.
READ: Binay twits Duterte: Your killing of the poor isn’t debatable
While he was hailed for his anti-crime crusade, Duterte had been linked to the Davao Death Squad, an alleged gang of assassins purportedly responsible for the deaths of 1,000 suspected criminals in the city since he became mayor in 1988.
“They say I am the death squad? True, that is true,” Duterte once said in a television interview admitting his ties to the alleged group.
READ: Duterte confirms ‘ties’ with Davao Death Squad
The New York-based Human Rights Watch has expressed concern for Duterte’s backing of extra-judicial killings amid a rise in summary executions of suspected criminals in Davao City.
The Human Rights Watch in a commentary even called Duterte the “Philippines’ Death Squad Mayor.”
“The Philippine government should take a zero-tolerance approach to any public official who publicly endorses extrajudicial killings as an acceptable means of crime control,” Phelim Kine, HRW deputy Asia director, said in a statement last year.
READ: Duterte to rights group: You are all hypocrites
When rights group Amnesty International in December 2015 issued a statement condemning Duterte’s record of human rights violations, Duterte said the group understated his record and bragged that he had killed 1,700 people, not 700 people.
READ: Amnesty Int’l raises red flags on Duterte