The Senate recently adopted a resolution honoring and recognizing the contribution of former Manila mayor and Senator Alfredo Lim in his 60 years as a public servant.
Lim passed away on August 8, 2020, at the age of 90.
Adopted was Senate Resolution No. (SRN) 494, in consideration of SRNs 498 and 501, “expressing the profound sympathy and sincere condolences of the Senate on the death of the Honorable Alfredo ‘Fred’ S. Lim,” former senator, former mayor of Manila, former director of the National Bureau of Investigation and the former secretary of the Department of Interior and Local Government.
SRN 494, filed by Senate President Tito Sotto III, and Senators Panfilo Lacson and Francis Tolentino stated that Lim served the Filipino people “with utmost dedication, honor, and dignity” for over six decades in various capacities.
Tolentino, in his sponsorship speech, said Lim started his public service as a policeman at the age of 22 and became one of the most decorated policemen in the country. In his earnest effort to clean Manila of drugs, prostitution and other criminalities as a police chief, he earned the tag “Dirty Harry.”
After serving the city of Manila as police chief, Lim continued to serve the city as mayor (1992-1998 and 2007-2013). Lim was appointed director of the NBI in 1989 and as DILG secretary in 2000.
In his brief stint as a senator (2004-2007), the resolution stated that Lim introduced bills “that would address the concerns of the people, particularly the poor, and the country such as giving free medicines, and medical care to indigent patients, protecting the families and relatives of the deceased from harassments of hospitals and funeral parlors, among others.
“The untimely demise of a true public servant, who had dedicated almost his entire life in serving his countrymen and whose principles and achievements in life are worth emulating but hard to duplicate, is a great loss not only to the bereaved family but to the nation as well,” the resolution further stated.
Senator Bato Dela Rosa, himself a former chief of the Philippine National Police, said most policemen looked up to Lim for his contribution to achieve peace and order in the country.
“I thank Mayor Lim for making this nation great through his humble contribution.”
“I thank Mayor Lim for making this nation great through his humble contribution,” Dela Rosa said.
Senator Joel Villanueva, together with Majority Leader Migz Zubiri, and Sens. Nancy Binay and Sonny Angara, filed SRN 498 “to remember the Philippines’ Dirty Harry.”
“His life and works will continue to lift the spirit of the Filipino people amid the COVID-19 pandemic.”
“Indeed, the life and works of former senator and Manila mayor Alfredo S. Lim will continue to lift the spirit of the Filipino people amid the COVID-19 pandemic. His courage, bravery and service to the nation will never be forgotten,” Villanueva said.
Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon, who was the Executive Secretary when Lim was the chief of the NBI, said the late senator was “indeed, a man of the law.”
“As I knew him, he would push the law to its acceptable limits because he would adhere to the rule of law. He wanted to provide a better political stability in our society then,” Drilon said.
Senator Grace Poe, asking that she be made co-author in the resolutions, recalled that Lim ran and won as a senator in 2004 under the Koalisyon ng Nagkakaisang Pilipino with her father, the late Fernando Poe Jr. as the standard bearer.
Poe said her family was very grateful to Lim as he was behind the installation of a 9-foot bronze statue of FPJ along Roxas Blvd. in front of the U.S. Embassy in 2012.
“I don’t think anyone has given my father that much honor, aside from the National Artist Award, and because of that, we thank him and we hope that his memory will live on,” the veteran legislator said.