By GENALYN KABILING
President Duterte has offered an apology to Vice President Leni Robredo for presuming that she invited a United Nations prosecutor to probe the war on drugs but his distrust of her remains.
The President admitted that he has realized the information he received about Robredo was “fake news.”
“I am sorry because I said you only realize that it is false news when the news comes out. And you hear it and you talk about it, you react to it, that is the problem,” he said in a television interview in Davao City last Saturday. “If she says that’s false news, ako, I believe her,” he added.
The President, however, maintained that he still does not trust Robredo, the co-chairperson of the Inter-Agency Committee on Illegal Drugs, since she belongs to the opposition.
Duterte previously said he would not fire Robredo but would limit her access to classified information to a need-to-know basis.
“There can never be a trust that can be nurtured between the two of us for the simple reason that Leni Robredo is with the opposition, ako andito sa kabila,” he said.
“There might be things that we might discuss in the Cabinet that is only good for the people for the same persuasion, baka it will travel back here, design or negligence o ano and nakakasira iyan,” he said.
Robredo had earlier denied Duterte’s claim that she invited a UN prober to visit the country since she now leads the anti-drug war, branding it as fake news. She made clear she met with officials of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and United States Embassy in Manila to tackle anti-drug efforts.
The President had also earlier decided against appointing Robredo to his Cabinet after supposedly committing “missteps,” including reaching out to foreign entities and personalities critical of his drug war.
He even threatened to slap a foreign human rights advocate, whom he apparently thought was a UN official, in front of Robredo.
He was alluding to Phelim Kine, former director of Human Rights Watch’s Asia division, who earlier said he was prepared to visit the country and advise Robredo on “how to end this murderous ‘drug war.'” Kine currently serves as director of research and investigations at Physicians for Human Rights.
