National Anti-Poverty Commission lead convenor Liza Maza has maintained her innocence in any involvement in the double murder cases filed against her and three other former party-list lawmakers before a lower court in Nueva Ecija.
In an exclusive GMA-7 interview, Maza denied she is hiding from the law.
“I am not a fugitive. I am not a criminal. The charges were just fabricated. These have been filed a long time ago, and that related cases have already been dismissed,” she said.
“I know we can prove it that I and the three other lawmakers are all innocent,” Maza added.
Meanwhile, Fr. Edwin Gariguez of the church-based National Secretariat for Social Action said raising a 12-year-old case against Maza and other former leftist lawmakers “may be a way to silence the opposition.”
The case is suggestive of martial law-era practice, Gariguez said in an article posed on the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines website.
“Arrest warrants issued based from trumped up charges for activists and militants are common strategy of the military and the government to harass and to silence opposition,” the priest said.
“We support the causes of [former Agrarian Reform secretary] Ka Paeng [Mariano] et al. We demand to stop tyranny and harassment of progressive groups,” he added.
Gariguez was referring to the warrant issued for a murder case filed in 2006 against Maza, Mariano, and former lawmakers Satur Ocampo and Teddy Casiño of Bayan Muna.
The NAPC chairman said she had already talked to Special Assistant to the President Christopher “Bong” Go, “who even asked me about the details of the charges.”
“Mr. President, we have not done anything wrong. Those charges were just fabricated,” she said.
Despite her absence at the NAPC office in Quezon City, Maza said “I will continue to stay as the lead convenor.”
“I will face the charges. Don’t worry,” she said, adding a hearing is set today (Friday).