It was unexpected, that Digong showed up and under oath admitted, among other things, to stuff that Sen. Bato denies, joke lang daw LOL. The real joke is that Bato and Sen. Go, the ones named by witnesses re Duterte’s drugwar operations in QuadComm House hearings, were allowed to be part of the investigating panel rather than made to sit with Digong to be investigated, questioned, too, under oath.
Laguna Rep Dan Fernandez noted that Dela Rosa ended up “interrogating resource persons” when “common sense dictates (that you) cannot be part of any investigation that you yourself are involved in.”
“He is one of the accused, but he is also part of the jury?” he added. https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1999082/house-members-hit-leeway-given
That the Senate was at once bashed by anti-DDS social media pundits for giving the former prez a platform yet again to rant and curse and be bastos — thank goodness for Sen. Risa #bullyforher — was expected. Unahan kasi na mag-livestream with immediate “analysis” na mostly kneejerk reactions, na usually full-of-oneself if not highly biased for or against whatever whomever.
Senate Prez Chiz was quick to respond: https://legacy.senate.gov.ph/press_release/
While noting that the testimonies made by Duterte during the Senate committee hearing were largely the same as when he was still in power, Escudero said the difference now is that he provided the latest utterings about the war on drugs under oath.
“Ang pinagkaiba kahapon, lahat ng binitiwan niyang salita kahapon ay under oath. Pinanumpahan at sinabi niya na ‘yan ay totoo abot sa kanyang nalalaman na pwedeng magamit kung saka-sakali pabor o laban sa kanya,” Escudero said.
He said the statements of Duterte were recorded and transcripts of the public hearing will be released for the reference of whichever party is interested and for the general public to peruse.
Unlike before when the spokespersons of former President Duterte defended his strong statements about the killing of drug personalities as merely words said in jest, Escudero said Duterte cannot claim the same now because he testified under oath.
I wonder now if this is Digong’s way of getting charges filed against him in court to somehow preempt the ICC. Nothing to lose? But if this be so, QuadComm is the way to go.