THE House of Representatives would do well to wait for the perfect opportunity before launching an impeachment proceeding against Vice President Sara Duterte, an administration-allied party-list lawmaker said yesterday.
“I think we leave it to the right time. Parang perfect date ‘yan e, hindi mo rin alam kung kailan hanggang nangyari na (It’s like a perfect date, you don’t know when it will happen until it just happens),” Rep. Jude Acidre (PL, Tingog) told reporters.
Acidre said there are no moves to oust the Vice President as of now even after Manila Rep. Joel Chua, chair of the House Committee on Good Government, has said he sees two possible grounds to impeach her.
The lawmaker said it was only the Vice President who has been claiming that the House is already plotting an impeachment move against her by looking for potential grounds during its ongoing investigation into her alleged misuse of funds in both the Office of the Vice President (OVP) and the Department of Education (DepEd). Duterte was concurrent education secretary from June 30, 2022, to July 19, 2024.
The Vice President has said the Chua panel’s investigation is merely a “fishing expedition” to look for grounds to remove her following her falling out with President Marcos Jr. and his administration.
Acidre reiterated the House’s investigation was not meant to persecute anyone because lawmakers are merely looking at ways to prevent such things from happening again.
He however agreed with Chua that the Vice President may face impeachment over grounds of graft and corruption and betrayal of public trust “by all technicalities.”
“Is the amount within the bounds of what can be considered plunder? Probably yes,” the lawmaker said. “Is it betrayal of public trust? I think pinaka-concrete na panuntunan ng public trust ay ang pag-handle ng public fund ‘di ba? (I think the most concrete basis of public trust is the handling of public funds, right?) So, if we were to be technical about it, yes.”
Chua last week said the Office of the Vice President’s (OVP) use of P16 million confidential funds for safe houses and the P15 million expenditure for a youth summit by the Department of Education (DepEd) when Duterte was the concurrent education secretary could be used as grounds to impeach her if she will not be able to explain how the funds were used.
He said that while his panel’s investigation was initially launched “in aid of legislation,” it has since uncovered possible grounds for Duterte’s impeachment, particularly graft and corruption and betrayal of public trust.
Chua said the Vice President could face impeachment for graft and corruption for alleged unaccounted P15 million in confidential funds of the DepEd for the Youth Leadership Summits (YLS) in 2023.
The panel has been pressing Duterte to explain why the DepEd falsely claimed to the Commission on Audit (COA) that it used the P15 million to pay for eight YLS events in 2023 when it was the AFP that actually paid for it.
Four military officers, including Army Col. Manaros Boransing, have told panel that the Philippine Army and local government units spent spend their own funds for the YLS activities.
Lawmakers noted that the Duterte-led DepEd used the certifications issued by these officers to justify the disbursement of the P15 million in confidential funds supposedly allocated for informant payments.
The Chua panel’s investigation was the offshoot of a privilege speech delivered by Manila Rep. Rolando Valeriano, who accused Duterte of fund mismanagement in the OVP based on COA findings, which disallowed over P73 million of the P125 million in confidential funds allocated to the OVP in 2022.
COA found that that the amount was spent within just 11 days, from December 21 to 31, 2022, which meant that the OVP had spent an average of over P11 million per day.
The Chua panel has also said it may recommend to the Office of the Ombudsman the filing of a plunder complaint against Duterte if she will fail to account for her P112.5 million confidential fund cash advances when she was still education secretary.
