Senior Digital Producer Eimor Santos contributed to this report.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 5) — Detained Senator Leila De Lima on Wednesday appealed to the Supreme Court over its junking of her case against President Rodrigo Duterte in relation to his verbal attacks against her.
The SC on October 15 last year dismissed De Lima’s petition for habeas data on the ground that the President is immune to any suit. However, De Lima in her motion for reconsideration argued that such resolution has “twisted the doctrine of presidential immunity out of all sense of meaning.”
The senator questioned the SC invoking Duterte’s immunity to acts that have nothing to do with the President’s official duties and responsibilities. The SC en banc resolution was made public on January 22.
“The Resolution gives President Duterte untrammeled and unbridled power to slut-shame, discriminate, insult, offend and bad-mouth the petitioner for as long as he sits on his presidential throne,” she said in a statement.
De Lima filed her habeas data petition — a legal remedy that would supposedly protect her from Duterte’s threats and tirades — in 2016 months after Duterte assumed the presidency, citing the President’s statements accusing her of corruption, illegal drug involvement and having an affair with her married driver.
She added that Duterte’s continued verbal attacks deprive her of her right to an effective remedy to violations, as protected by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
De Lima cited a recent speech of the President on January 23, a day after the SC released its resolution, where he insisted that De Lima is a criminal.
“‘Di sila motuo nga si De Lima kriminal gyud. Nga nagkoleksyon gyud og kwarta para sa election niya,” Duterte previously said.
[Translation: They refused to believe De Lima is a criminal. That she was collecting money to use in her campaign]
De Lima has been detained since 2017 on drug charges, which she and human rights groups believe were fabricated to silence her for being a staunch critic of the Duterte administration and the bloody war on drugs.
Malacañang has repeatedly denied retaliating against De Lima, stressing that her drug charges are being tried by the country’s independent courts, and that the constitutionality of her arrest and detention has been upheld by the Supreme Court.
