De Lima says Duterte, Aguirre should be arrested, not her

Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II should first arrest President Rodrigo Duterte and then himself for committing the “most seditious and murderous act of inciting people to violence” against drug suspects, Senator Leila de Lima said on Thursday.

This was how De Lima, former Justice Secretary, responded to Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II’s warning against issuing statements that could be considered “inciting to sedition.”

READ: Aguirre warns De Lima over inciting to sedition

While Aguirre thinks calling Duterte a “sociopathic serial killer” was seditious, the senator explained that sedition includes committing “any act of hate or revenge against private persons or any social class” for “any political or social end.”

And when the Justice Secretary declared criminal suspects and addicts and users as not part of humanity, he reinforced the President’s pronouncement that they could be killed as a group without committing a crime against humanity, De Lima said.

“Aguirre should arrest his boss, then arrest himself, for committing the most seditious and murderous act of inciting people to violence against mere suspected pushers and users since the past seven months,” the senator said in a statement.

“This regime has been committing acts of sedition since the beginning for pitting the population against each other in a drug war that calls for the elimination of an entire class of the population which, according to the President, consists of three million pushers and users,” she said.

De Lima said the “single most abominable act of sedition” was Aguirre and Duterte inciting acts of hate and violence on the people they identify as no longer humans when the Constitution clearly provides that no one should be deprived of life without due process of law.

By calling a part of the population as sub-humans and ordering their killing without due process, the senator said, “this regime has overthrown constitutional order through a political coup and by perverting an electoral mandate in order to perpetrate a policy of premeditated mass murder.”

“Arestuhin at kasuhan mo muna si Duterte at sarili mo, Ginoong Aguirre, bago ako (Arrest and charge Duterte and yourself first before arresting and charging me),” De Lima said.

The senator described Aguirre and Duterte as “rebels and inciters against a constitutional order that values life and due process above everything else.”

“They have overthrown our constitutional government when they called for the elimination of an entire social class of suspected pushers and users, resulting in the murders and summary killings in our urban poor communities,” she said.

“Sila ang mga rebelde at kriminal na dapat arestuhin, hindi ako (They are the rebels and criminals who must be arrested),” De Lima added. CDG