IN WHAT LOOKS more like a reward, the National Bureau of Investigation’s (NBI) witness in the Senate impeachment trial seemed to have got what he wanted — out of a region known for violence.
No less than NBI Director Melvin Matibag confirmed that lawyer Jeremy Lotoc who was previously assigned to the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) has been tapped to call shots for the NBI Eastern Visayas region.
BARMM is known to be a hotbed of warlords.
“Yes…we rotate personnel regularly,” Matibag told reporters in a Viber message.
The NBI chief however clarified that Lotoc’s reassignment was not a promotion.
In a Facebook post, Tacloban City Mayor Alfred Romualdez introduced Lotoc as the “newly assigned” regional director of Eastern Visayas.
According to Mayor Romualdez, he met Lotoc in a courtesy call where they discussed steps to make the region more peaceful in the midst of back-to-back campus violence stirring up local government efforts in promoting Tacloban as a peace zone.
“One of the things that I highlighted to the new director is the need to strengthen the advocacy for responsible gun safety and ownership, especially in relation to the shooting incidents in schools,” Romualdez said.
Prior to the so-called “reassignment,” Lotoc made headlines as one of the NBI’s witnesses who testified in Duterte’s impeachment trial.
Aside from being the former regional director of BARMM, Lotoc also headed the NBI Cybercrime Division. It was during his tenure that the NBI Cybercrime Division probed the supposed threats made by Duterte against President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., his wife Liza Araneta-Marcos and cousin Leyte Rep. Martin Romualdez.
In the impeachment trial, Lotoc testified that the threats Duterte made were legitimate.
“Based on our findings, we believe that the Vice President committed the crime of grave threats and inciting to sedition… prima facie evidence with reasonable certainty of conviction,” Lotoc said on July 13.
