Former Senator Antonio Trillanes IV said Tuesday that some senior Philippine National Police (PNP) officials are allegedly involved in recruiting members to join an attempted destabilization plot against President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr.

“There were some active senior PNP officials who have been recruiting members since last year, but they still haven’t recruited anyone,” Trillianes said at a press briefing.

Trillanes said the plot seeks to replace Marcos with Vice President Sara Duterte.

“The purpose of the ouster plot is to overthrow the President. Therefore, who will replace him? His daughter who is the vice president,” he said.

According to Trillanes, the plot was meant to shield Duterte from being possibly served an arrest warrant against him by the International Criminal Court (ICC) linked to his war on drugs.

He claimed that arrest warrants could be served in June.

“The ICC investigation is at the stage where it is almost finished and they might request a warrant…that’s why we are expecting this by June and it may spill over to July,” Trillanes alleged.

The arrest warrants will be ''in batches'', claimed Trillanes.

“The first batch is Duterte, the father. The second batch, maybe (Senator) Bong Go, Bato (Senator Ronald dela Rosa), and Vice President Sara Duterte. Then, the third batch would be some PNP officials and some other senior officials of the Duterte administration,” he added.

In a separate press briefing, PNP spokesperson Col. Jean Fajardo denied that there are active police officers involved.

“I talked to the PNP Chief himself and intelligence units regarding that earlier issue and we have not monitored any active police that are allegedly involved in that destabilization plot. We have not monitored any destabilization plot for that matter,” Fajardo said. Jaspearl Tan/DMS