Senate sets ‘dangerous precedent’ with Duterte impeachment case remand: expert, lawmaker

Senators discuss a proposal to convene the Senate as an impeachment court to hear the case against Vice President Sara Duterte. Voltaire F. Domingo, Senate Social Media Unit/Joseph B. Vidal, OSP

MANILA — The Senate had set a “dangerous precedent” when it sent the impeachment case against Vice President Sara Duterte back to the House, lawmaker and a legal expert said Wednesday.

Eighteen senators on Tuesday voted in favor of the motion to remand the impeachment case back to the House, which must now certify that it did not violate the constitution and that it remains willing to prosecute the case when its new members take their seats on June 30.

“What the Senate does is to open the door to future impeachments where you have the Senate and the House playing ping pong with each other,” said Paolo Tamase, an assistant professor of the University of the Philippines (UP) College of Law.

“The Senate made a dangerous precedent,” added House impeachment prosecutor and Iloilo Rep. Lorenz Defensor. 

Sara Duterte impeachment trial ‘in limbo’ after Senate returns case to House: expert

Tamase noted that the 1987 Constitution lays out “very orderly process of the House getting the first dibs at the question of whether a high official violated or committed impeachable offenses and then the Senate gets a term to try and decide that question.”

The Senate’s move to send back the impeachment case “was a clear breach of their duty at saka a breach of public trust,” Defensor said.

“To remand is not an option; it is either acquit or convict after trial. Malinaw na pagsagasa ito sa ating Konstitusyon at sa ating demokrasya,” he told DZMM.

Tamase said that while the House can refuse to accept the impeachment case back, “the practical action might be for the House to comply, but comply with indication that they found this act to be offensive.”

“This doesn’t stop the House from protesting how this violates the co-equality between the Senate and the House,” he told ANC.

The House impeached Duterte in early February on charges of graft, corruption and an alleged assassination plot against one-time ally and former running mate President Ferdinand Marcos. A conviction, which requires the support of two-thirds of the Senate's 24 members, would mean her removal as vice president and a permanent ban from public office.

But just hours after senators had taken their oaths as jurors on Tuesday, Sen. Ronald dela Rosa introduced a motion to dismiss the impeachment case.

He argued that earlier complaints filed against Duterte in the House, which did not make it past the committee level, had constituted multiple impeachment proceedings within a year, something banned under the Philippine constitution.

The motion was later amended in favor of sending the case back to the House, which must now certify that it did not violate the constitution and that it remains willing to prosecute the case when its new members take their seats on June 30.

'FUNCTIONAL DISMISSAL'

Hontiveros has warned that returning the case to the lower body was an abrogation of responsibility that would see it ultimately disappear."

Remanding is a functional dismissal," she said, later adding the impeachment complaint was "being dismantled brick by brick".

Senate President Francis Escudero, however, insisted there was no such motive behind the body's decision."The intention is to give the prosecutors an opportunity to answer certain questions in a manner that does not waste the time of the court," he said.

Following the vote, Escudero issued a summons for the vice president, who will have 10 days from its receipt to answer the impeachment charges.

On Monday, Duterte's defense team said in a statement they were "ready to confront the charges and expose the baselessness of the accusations against the Vice President".

— With a report from Agence France-Presse