Sen. Leila de Lima and President Duterte INQUIRER FILE PHOTOS/LYN RILLON/JOAN BONDOC
AN EXASPERATED Sen. Leila de Lima could only wonder whether President Duterte whom she called “the vilest man in the country” had the hots for her.
“Ano pong gusto n’yo sa akin? May gusto po ba kayo sa akin? (What do you want from me? Do you want something from me?)” De Lima said in ending an interview with reporters as she proceeded to the Senate floor for on Monday’s session.
In a statement last night, the senator added:
“I cannot resist asking the President, ‘What do you see in me that you find so sexual? Why is your mind so fixated on my sexual aspect?’ You are so obsessed with me. Why?”
READ: De Lima to Duterte: ‘What do you see in me that you find sexual?’ | Duterte warns De Lima: ‘Don’t fight me; you’ll lose’
“I cannot resist asking the President, ‘What do you see in me that you find so sexual? Why is your mind so fixated on my sexual aspect?’ You are so obsessed with me. Why?”
De Lima raised these questions after being the object of the fiery temper of Mr. Duterte, a known ladies’ man, for the nth time on Monday.
‘May God forgive him’
Speaking to reporters on the latest tirade of the President who said De Lima would be jailed for her alleged links with drug convicts at New Bilibid Prison (NBP), the senator said she pitied Mr. Duterte. “[M]ay God forgive him for what he is doing,” she said.
The senator was asked to comment on the President’s statements on Monday before the Malacañang Press Corps after he presided over the induction of its new officers. He said De Lima would be jailed for protecting drug lords.
“He’s now the lowest and the vilest man in the country for his rudeness,” De Lima said of Mr. Duterte.
She also pleaded for the President to stop his tirades against her.
In his remarks in Malacañang, Mr. Duterte, apparently referring to a purported video of De Lima, then justice secretary, alone with a drug convict in his room at NBP, said: “Every time I watch the video, I lose my appetite. Only people who will fall for her are … I am not a guard or a motorcycle cop or convict.”
READ: Duterte: De Lima’s ‘sexcapades’ led her to crime, drug pay-offs
He said De Lima should not treat with “nonchalance the horrible things” she had done to the country.
Desecration
In her statement, De Lima said the President’s “foul mouth had again desecrated the hollowed grounds of Malacañang with another round of his vile personal attacks against me.”
She denied Mr. Duterte’s repeated accusations over her alleged drug links.
Since he took office on June 30, the President has attacked De Lima, calling her an “immoral” woman for allegedly having a relationship with her married bodyguard, who in turn Mr. Duterte claimed was accepting money for his boss from drug lords.
The attacks against De Lima stepped up as she, as chair of the Senate justice and human rights committee, launched an inquiry into extrajudicial killings of suspects in the administration’s war on drugs. More than 3,000 drug suspects and dealers have so far been killed in the campaign against illegal drugs.
READ: De Lima: Killings may lead to charges of crimes against humanity
Last week, De Lima was ousted as committee chair following the testimony of confessed hit man Edgar Matobato, who claimed that Mr. Duterte as Davao City mayor had ordered him and other members of the Davao Death Squad to kill 1,000 people, mostly criminals.
De Lima is also the subject of a House inquiry into the continued alleged drug operations of drug convicts inside NBP.
Several NBP inmates testified that they made payoffs to De Lima when she was justice secretary as protection money through her alleged lieutenants, including drug convict Jaybee Sebastian. De Lima last week said Sebastian was a government asset at the time her office was looking into the drug trade at NBP.
The senator also has been at the receiving end of hate texts and messages after her phone number was revealed at the House inquiry. She said the messages could only come from “trolls and Duterte fanatics.” With a report from Gil C. Cabacungan
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