Paolo Duterte to file raps vs Trillanes

DAVAO CITY, Philippines — Presidential son and former Davao City vice mayor Paolo Duterte will file charges against Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV for implicating him in the smuggling of P6.4 billion worth of shabu last year.

Duterte yesterday accused Trillanes of “viciously destroying my name, maligning my reputation and integrity and deliberately manufacturing lies and spreading black propaganda against me.”

He said Trillanes was “emboldened by his false reliance on and abuse of his parliamentary immunity.”

“This immunity does not apply to libelous remarks made during media interviews... as these attacks were done outside the halls of the Senate and definitely not when these were discharged with the pure intention of destroying me,” he said.

Duterte had earlier denied the allegations.

Trillanes said he would face the charges even as he stressed that the evidence against Trillanes ”was both direct and circumstantial.”

”It’s not as if I just took his name out in thin air and dragged and linked it to his own mess,” the senator said.

Meanwhile, in reaction to Trillanes’ statement that he does not have time for a word war, Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio said the senator is a “coward.”

“May time ka mag presscon pero wala kang time pag sinagot ka...I do not know why you became a soldier and a senator. Such a disgrace,” Carpio said.

She lashed at Trillanes for saying the President ordered her to run for higher office in 2022 to perpetuate their family in power.

Carpio said Trillanes should leave her alone, noting that she could make life hard for people who caught her ire. – With Marvin Sy