A spokesman for Senator Panfilo "Ping" Lacson said Friday that the former anti-kidnapping czar is not avoiding the issue of his alleged involvement in the killing of publicist Salvador "Bubby" Dacer and his driver, Emmanuel Corbito in November 2000.

"We really don't know what will Boy (Cezar) Mancao will say. All we have is an affidavit issued three months ago in Florida, which is different from his previous statements," Lacson's spokesman Lito Banayo told ABS-CBN's morning show, "Umagang Kay Ganda."

Banayo said Lacson would only make media statements about the double murder case once he is implicated by Mancazo during the preliminary investigation at the Department of Justice.

Lacson avoided media interviews after Mancao's return from the United States on Thursday morning. At least two senators spoke on his behalf, including Senator Loren Legarda and Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile.

Legarda said the National Bureau of Investigation's 200-man security team was an overkill while Enrile said Mancao's affidavit executed in the United States last February is not enough to pin down Lacson.

In his February 2009 affidavit, Mancao claimed he heard Lacson order former Senior Superintendent Michael Ray Aquino to kill Dacer sometime in October 2000. He said they were inside the vehicle of Lacson, who was then chief of the Philippine National Police and chief of the defunct Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Task Force.

Mancao said Lacson told him to cover up the double murder. He said Dacer was murdered because then President Joseph Estrada was angry at the publicist.

Lacson and Estrada have denied involvement in the murders.

Banayo said the sudden turnaround of Mancao is obviously a political maneuver of Lacson's enemies. He said that with Lacson attacks against high officials of the Arroyo, it is only natural for some people to move against him, especially now that he has declared his plan to run again for president in 2010.