Panelo’s birthday wish for De Lima: a sound sleep

Senator Leila de Lima. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

A sound sleep.

This is the birthday wish of presidential legal counsel Salvador Panelo to Sen. Leila de Lima on her 57th birthday on Saturday, August 27.

“According to President [Rodrigo] Duterte, Senator De Lima has been having nightmares. So my birthday wish to the good senator is I hope she sleeps soundly tonight and thereafter,” Panelo told reporters in a chance interview on Friday.

READ: De Lima is ‘finished’ – Duterte

President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday revealed a drug matrix showing de Lima’s alleged involvement in the drug operation at the New Bilibid Prison (NBP).

De Lima has vehemently denied the allegations, calling Duterte’s drug matrix a garbage.

READ: De Lima: I pity Duterte

The former justice secretary told the President to leave her alone.

“Lubayan? Parang hindi pa yata nag-uumpisa si Presidente. Parang patikim lang ata iyon ah (Leave her alone? The President seems like he has not even started. It’s like he’s just giving her a sample),” Panelo said.

Duterte has said that De Lima might be experiencing “nightmares” after he launched tirades against the neophyte senator.

In an interview at the Senate, De Lima said she could think of only two birthday wishes.

READ: De Lima’s birthday wishes involve Duterte, new love life

She had asked the President to stop hurling allegations at her, saying it seemed he was “bent on destroying her at all cost.”

Her other wish involves her now controversial love life.

The senator, who has revealed that she is not seeing anyone lately, said she hoped to have someone who could share her burden of being the President’s favorite “whipping boy.”

Duterte recently alleged that De Lima’s new lover was named “Warren.” But the senator denied this, saying the alleged lover was only part of her security detail./rga