A judge of a Muntinlupa court, who is handling the last and remaining illegal drug case of former senator Leila de Lima, voluntarily inhibits himself from the case.

The inhibition comes after de Lima's co-accused and former aides Ronnie Dayan and Joenel Sanchez, as well as former Bureau of Correction (BuCor) chief Franklin Bucayu filed a motion before Muntinlupa City Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 256 seeking to inhibit Judge Romeo Buenaventura last June 13.

According to the co-accused, Buenaventura is the brother of lawyer Emmanuel Buenaventura who allegedly counseled Dayan in executing his affidavit implicating de Lima in the illegal drug trading.

Dayan earlier retracted his allegation against the former senator and said that he was only coerced to do so.

In an order dated June 15 but released to the media on Friday, the Muntinlupa RTC 256 presiding judge Buenaventura said he voluntarily removed himself from the case.

"Simply put, the suspicion of the accused-movants, while unfounded if not contrived, cannot be ignored since it is already tarnished the integrity and impartiality of the Court as well as the needed trust and confidence in all subsequent proceeding in the instant case," he said.

"For this reason, the undersigned Presiding judge will exercise his discretion and will recuse himself from further hearing this case not because the allegations are true, but because it is his avowed duty as a member of the Bench to promote confidence in the judicial system," the judge added.

The case of de Lima will be re-raffled to other branches of the Muntinlupa City RTC for the continuation of the proceedings.

Last June 7, Buenaventura denied the plea of de Lima to gain provisional freedom as he said that the court finds the humanitarian grounds cited by the latter “not compelling.”