MANILA - Ombudsman Conchita Carpio Morales on Tuesday said her successor should not only have integrity but should also be able to withstand the pressure in being the top graft-buster of the country.

Morales, who was appointed July 2011, is set to retire July this year after finishing a seven-year term.

“One has to be impervious to pressure, one has to have integrity. you may be the brightest fellow in the world but if you don’t have integrity, then forget it,” Morales said during a forum on integrity and justice in Quezon City.

Asked about the nomination of Supreme Court Justice Teresita De Castro during the open forum, Morales gave a safe answer.

“For as long as a person is not disqualified, he or she can be nominated,” Morales said.

Pressed on who might be the next Ombudsman, Morales refused to answer.

“I cannot second guess,” Morales said.

Associate Justice Teresita De Castro is among those nominated to replace Morales.

Retired associate justice Arturo Brion nominated De Castro as Ombudsman in a letter to the Judicial and Bar Council (JBC) last Wednesday.

• READ: Supreme Court's De Castro nominated as Ombudsman

"Through all these years, she has served the government with competence, probity and integrity," reads Brion's 2-page letter.

"Her long years in the prosecutorial service (almost 19 years) and in the Sandiganbayan (more than 10 years), not to mention her more than a decade of experience as an associate justice of the Supreme Court qualify her for the position of Ombudsman," it added.

De Castro, who had testified in the impeachment hearings against Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno, is set to retire from the Supreme Court in October.