Home 
ILOILO CITY ? Ousted President Joseph Estrada is keeping his distance from Sen. Panfilo Lacson, his former fair-haired boy who has left the country to evade arrest on charges of double murder in the killing of publicist Salvador "Bubby' Dacer and his driver Emmanuel Corbito in 2000.
"He is no longer under me. He is a senator now. I think he is intelligent [enough] to know what to do," Estrada said Wednesday night when asked to comment on Lacson's statement that he had fled and that his indictment for the November 2000 Dacer-Corbito murders constituted harassment by the Arroyo administration.
Estrada, the standard-bearer of the Pwersa ng Masang Pilipino, visited Iloilo City in the company of his running mate, Makati Mayor Jejomar Binay.
He told the Inquirer he did not want to give "unsolicited advice" to Lacson.
"He knows how to defend himself and he knows what he is doing," Estrada said of Lacson, who was a former trusted ally and served under his administration as chief of the Philippine National Police.
Charges were filed against Lacson on January 7 for the double murder case based on the testimony of his former police aide, Cezar Mancao II. Mancao had alleged that he heard Lacson order the killing of Dacer. INQUIRER
