A P1-million bounty has been raised by a group of individuals for any information leading to Ronnie Dayan, the former driver and ex-lover of Senator Leila de Lima, as a cabinet official called for the beleaguered senator to resign.
The Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption (VACC) and its legal counsel, Ferdinand Topacio, presented the reward in cash along with a “wanted” poster of Dayan Tuesday, November 15, in Quezon City.
The group said the bounty was raised by disgruntled citizens and no politician donated. It will be kept at the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI).
VACC chairman Dante Jimenez said the group will coordinate with the Philippine National Police to create a hotline number for informants on Dayan’s whereabouts.
Dayan remains missing as authorities recently failed to find him in his residence in Urbiztondo, Pangasinan.
President Rodrigo Duterte himself tagged Dayan as De Lima’s lover and bagman for the drug money that was proliferating inside the New Bilibid Prison.
Call for resignation
De Lima confessed she had an affair with Dayan in an exclusive interview with Winnie Monsod on “Bawal ang Pasaway” that aired Monday evening on GMA News TV.
A day after the interview aired, De Lima kept silent when pressed further about her revelations.
Instead, the senator issued a statement reiterating she had already said her piece, asking the public to “respect my right to privacy over my personal life and not impute any more malice.”
De Lima further said that “some decisions and relationships in our past have not been the best and the wisest. I have learned from these experiences and resolved to use my pain to focus on the good I can do.”
But chief presidential legal counsel Salvador Panelo called for the senator to resign “to save the Senate from further embarrassment.”
Panelo said De Lima’s tell-all vindicates the the president and validates his claims that she “committed unlawful and immoral acts.”
Panelo even suggested the revelation “opens her to a criminal charge of adultery, her lover being a married man” as well as to being expelled by the Senate ethics committee and being disbarred.
De Lima said in the interview that Dayan had long been estranged from his wife.
Justice secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II likewise believes De Lima’s admission will further pin her down over her alleged involvement in the Bilibid drug trade.
Aguirre had instructed the NBI to furnish a copy of the interview for use as evidence against her in court.
De Lima had consistently denied having benefitted from the Bilibid drug trade and using Dayan to liaise with the incarcerated drug lords, accusing the president instead of being vindictive as she opposed his bloody war on illegal drugs.
The post P 1-M Bounty Out for De Lima's Driver-Lover Dayan appeared first on Manila Bulletin
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