After being released on bail from six years of detention at the Philippine National Police (PNP) Custodial Center due to alleged drug cases, former Senator Leila de Lima said she plans to spend “quality time” with her 91-year-old mother and family in Camarines Sur.

In an interview with GMA Integrated News Tuesday, De Lima said that aside from visiting her elderly mother, she is also considering returning to work as a lawyer or as a law professor.

“I will spend a few days, private quality time with my mom and my family. And then I’ll be really pondering my options. Because I have several options. One of those is to return to law practice while the other is to go back to teaching in law school,” De Lima said.

“But whatever would be the next calling that I’ll be indulging in, it will always be based on my advocacies,” she added.

Asked if she would file cases against those who accused her of being involved in illegal drug activities, she said there is “always a possibility”.

“I can’t just simply forget what they did to me. But at this point, I don’t want to dwell on it for now. It’s part of my vindication. It’s part of attaining complete and true justice. Because everything had been wrong from the start and then it took more than six years of my life. These are the prime years of my life,” she said.

De Lima said her legal team struggled to prove her innocence despite evidence against her supposedly being weak.

“My legal team was doing its best to prove to the court that these charges were really baseless charges, but we have to go through the process. And that’s really one of the loopholes of the system,” De Lima said.

“There is a process you have to go through. It really took so, so long for the process to come to an end. And three cases were filed against me. And three of those cases are being dismantled little by little,” she said.

“To this day, I stand by my innocence and believe I will be vindicated in due time,” she added. Jaspearl Tan/DMS