Press Release
December 30, 2019

Dispatch from Crame No. 688:
Sen. Leila M. de Lima's Statement on the Attempts to Obfuscate the Issue, Re: U.S. Entry Ban

12/30/19

The obfuscation coming from the DDS camp regarding the US visa ban enacted in the 2020 US Appro Law, as initiated by their amateur ideologue-blogger RJ Nieto and echoed by officials like the Senate President, reflects panic, confusion, fear, and denial among their ranks, especially those with a lot to lose like access to their assets and properties stashed in the US.

The amateur "legal" opinion of Nieto was their desperate attempt to deny a fact finally affirmed by none other than the Philippine Embassy in the US itself and admitted by Malacañang.

This obfuscation strategy is also an attempt to downgrade, if not undermine, the very significance of the US visa ban.

DDS officialdom is grasping at straws in denying the fact that finally, something had hit them, and hit them hard where it counts -- travel access to the centers of the western world. To use a popular colloquial phrase, "affected much talaga kayo." But why? Why do you care so much for being denied access to the West, when your political values hew more closely with those of China and Russia?

As I said, you cannot be citizens of Rome and behave like barbarians. You decide to be barbarians, you must only expect to be ostracized from the world of civilized nations and live in the periphery, excluded from the center of civilization.

As for DOJ Sec. Guevarra, who said he does not give a damn if he is banned in the US, and who asked the US Senators or their staff to come to the Philippines to see the evidence against me, he should make up his mind. The Bureau of Immigration which is directly under him has just banned the US Senators from the Philippines. So how can they come here to see the evidence?

Hindi lang kayo nagpapanic, gulong-gulo pa kayo kung iimbitahin ba o ipagbabawal ba ninyo ang mga senador ng Amerika sa Pilipinas.

Apparently, panic time also becomes amateur time, when Malacañang's information about the travel ban has to come from media, then "debunked" as fake news by their amateur ideologue-cum-mediocre scholar RJ Nieto. It is only after the panic and confusion that Malacañang resorted to the official way of verifying information, by asking its own embassy in the US.

Para silang mga anay na nabulabog, nagtuturuan at nanunumbat sa isa't isa.

Sa katotohanan, yan lang naman ang bunga ng pagkilos ninyo nang naaayon sa tinatawag ninyong soberanya. Sa pagwawalang-bahala ninyo sa paalala ng mga sibilisadong bansa na hindi puwedeng balewalain ninuman ang karapatang pantao, ginagawa lang naman nila kung ano rin ang naaayon sa kanilang soberanya, ang huwag papasukin sa kanilang mga bansa o bigyang ayuda ang mga mamamatay-tao at ang mga naglalapastangan sa karapatang pantao, at ang mga pumapalapak sa mga ito. ###

(Access the handwritten copy of Dispatch from Crame No. 688, here: https://issuu.com/senatorleilam.delima/docs/dispatch_688)

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