Vicente Leon Ventura Magistrado de Lima II is the youngest sibling of detained Filipina Senator Leila M. de Lima. As former Chairperson of the Philippine Commission on Human Rights (2008-2010), Philippine Secretary of Justice (2010-2015), and now incumbent Senator of the Republic of the Philippines (2016-present), Leila de Lima has and continues to vigorously protect and promote the just rule of law.
In 2009, Senator Leila de Lima investigated the alleged involvement of President Rodrigo R. Duterte, then Davao City Mayor, in the so-called Davao Death Squad that was said to be responsible for the extrajudicial killing of hundreds of people; as Secretary of Justice, she uncovered a system of corruption and criminality that exposed drug lords and put a former President and three Senators behind bars; and later, as the new Chairperson of the Senate’s Committee on Justice and Human Rights and against a background of mounting deaths that accompanied President Duterte’s “war on drugs”, she convened hearings on extrajudicial killings in the hopes of shedding light on what had made alarms sound worldwide.
But for her courageous defense of the rule of law, Senator De Lima was vilified and demonized in a ‘trial by publicity’ intended to justify an arrest warrant — based primarily on testimony given by drug lord convicts she helped expose — aiming to silence her in solitude.
Since her prompt and peaceful surrender to authorities, Senator De Lima has been arbitrarily detained in conditions and circumstances that restrict her capacity to discharge her mandate as incumbent Senator. However, Senator De Lima has not relented, authoring or co-authoring, as of 4 February 2019, 142 bills and 145 proposed resolutions, out of which 113 and 122 respectively were filed in detention.
Indeed, even though, as an Opinion adopted by the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention declares, “[Senator] De Lima’s deprivation of liberty resulted from her personal conviction and public statements regarding extrajudicial killings in the Philippines,” she continues to speak truth to power and hold power accountable to truth.
