MANILA, Philippines — International parliamentarians calling for Sen. Leila De Lima's release from detention do not understand the Philippine Constitution, Senate President Aquilino "Koko" Pimentel said on Thursday.
Pimentel said lawmakers in the Philippines do not have immunity from arrest unlike in other countries as he urged the International Parliamentary Union to keep the Senate out of the legal woes of its members.
"It's unfortunate that the IPU doesn't understand the Philippine Constitution. That's their problem not ours," Pimentel said in a text message to Philstar.com.
The Geneva-based IPU has reiterated its call to the Philippine government to release De Lima.
The IPU Governing Council, on its 138th closing assembly, adopted a resolution dated March 28 that expressed "deep concern" on De Lima's continued pre-trial detention. She has yet to be arraigned on drug-related cases filed against her and has been detained for more than a year.
The IPU asked the Philippines to "release De Lima immediately and to abandon the legal proceedings against her, unless serious evidence is rapidly forthcoming."
Pimentel said, however, that if the IPU insists "that we observe their rules, then they are insulting us and not respecting our sovereignty to determine our own rules."
He said De Lima's lawyers should be allowed to work on her release from detention and her opportunity to attend sessions of the Senate.
"Remember that she is facing drug charges. Keep the Senate out of the drug or corruption cases of its current or former members," said the Senate president, whom De Lima represented in his electoral protest against Sen. Juan Miguel Zubiri in the 2007 elections.
"Why does the IPU feel that they know Senator De Lima’s case better than our Supreme Court and other courts which have heard and studied her case(s) up to the minutest detail?" Pimentel
IPU also called for De Lima release in 2017
Last year, the IPU also released a report dated October 18 that sought De Lima's release from detention.
The group said that the charges against De Lima "came in response to her vocal opposition to President Duterte's war on drugs, including her denunciation of her alleged responsibility for the extrajudicial killings, and that there is no evidence to justify criminal cases against her."
READ: Int’l lawmakers group calls for De Lima’s release
The Malacañang however said that De Lima was put in detention because of a drug case, and not because of her political beliefs.
READ: Palace corrects Aquino: De Lima not in jail for political beliefs
In 2016, Duterte threatened to “destroy” De Lima after she called for a Senate probe into deaths involving the administration’s war against drugs.
The chief executive, in a speech, revealed that the senator had an illicit affair with her former aide—and co-accused in the drug case—who is believed to have ties with drug lords.