Paolo Duterte comes to father’s defense, insists Rody never retaliated vs critics

MANILA, Philippines — Rep. Paolo Duterte (Davao City) on Thursday insisted that his statements alleging Rep. France Castro (ACT Teachers) overreacted to the televised death threats hurled against her by his father was his way of defending his family. 

"It is imperative upon me to stand by my family and protect my family… That's where I'm coming from,” Duterte said in a statement his office sent to Philstar.com.

“You filed a case, let the court look at the merits. Simple as that. Like what I said, it is your right,” the lawmaker said in a mix of English and Filipino, adding that he has “heard worse” than the words uttered by former President Rodrigo Duterte against Castro.

The Davao City representative is the eldest son of the former president and the latest member of the Duterte family to issue a public rebuttal against critics who have condemned the elder Duterte for issuing grave threats on national television.

This comes after Rep. France Castro (ACT Teachers) on Monday filed the first criminal complaint against Rodrigo Duterte after his presidency over the remarks he uttered during an interview on media network SMNI.

During the televised interview, which was also streamed in a now-deleted YouTube video, the former president said: “Pero ang una mong target sa intelligence fund… ikaw France. Kayong mga komunista ang gusto kong patayin (But, the first target of your intelligence fund… is you France. I want to kill all you communists.)”

Reacting to the criminal complaint, Paolo Duterte on Wednesday said that Castro was “onion-skinned” for pursuing charges against his father. 

Castro then clapped back at the House lawmaker, stressing that death threats made publicly “ endanger the lives of people” and “fosters the state of impunity.”

In a new statement on Thursday, Paolo Duterte accused Castro of “sensationalizing” the issue and called on the Makabayan bloc lawmaker to exert the same effort in “(protecting) the farmers and innocent victims killed by members of the New People’s Army.”

Castro has repeatedly been accused of allying with rebel groups by Paolo’s sister, Vice President Sara Duterte — one of many allegations that the Alliance of Concerned Teachers elevated to the International Labor Organization in its complaint.

‘Never filed a case’

Paolo Duterte had also argued that the former president has “received much harsher and humiliating criticisms in the past but never filed a case against anyone.”

Drug war critic and former senator Sen. Leila De Lima has been detained since 2017 over drug charges she says have been fabricated by the Duterte administration to punish her for her speaking out against the extrajudicial killings committed in the president’s campaign against illegal drugs.

In 2016, Duterte himself said he wanted to “destroy” De Lima for having “libeled” and “slandered” him.

During his presidency, Duterte's congressional allies also delivered on his promise to shut down ABS-CBN, the country’s largest broadcasting network, for what he described as biased coverage for not airing his political advertisements.

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Similarly, Duterte threatened to disrupt the operations of the Philippine Daily Inquirer and publicly labeled Rappler a “fake news outlet” for its coverage of his policies — public pronouncements that press freedom advocates have made media practitioners toe down the line in fear of retribution.

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Coming to the defense of her fellow Makabayan bloc lawmaker, Rep. Arlene Brosas (Gabriela Women’s Party) pointed out that the president has “hunted down ordinary people” for speaking against the policies of his administration.

“We would like to remind Davao City 1st District Rep. Paolo Duterte that his father's statement should be taken seriously, considering his bloody legacy of extrajudicial killings and political persecution under his administration,” Brosas said.

Brosas also added that the president had previously “had a high school teacher arrested for merely voicing out his frustrations in social media.”

In a message to Philstar.com, Castro said that there is a "pattern" followed by members of the Duterte family in government who evade issues through "gaslighting and red-tagging of victims." 

"Again, we would like to know how did VP Duterte use the P125 million in illegal confidential funds in 2022? Where did former President Duterte use his confidential funds? How did the confidential funds in Davao City reach P2.6 billion?" Castro said. 

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“Let's drop this act of gaslighting and victim-blaming,” Brosas said.

“The only people who need to come clean and face the consequences of their actions are those who have been hiding behind their confidential funds and avoiding public scrutiny,” the lawmaker added.

— with reports by Xave Gregorio