SENATE President Francis Escudero yesterday said he rejected the proposal of the House of Representatives to issue summons to Vice President Sara Duterte to compel her to answer the impeachment complaint against her.
He said the House should know well that impeachment rules states that a writ of summons can be issued only once the impeachment court is convened.
The House prosecution panel on Tuesday asked the Senate in a motion to require Duterte to file an answer to the Articles of Impeachment “within a non-extendible period of 10 days from receipt of the writ of summons.” It said Senate rules do not support the chamber’s plan to require Duterte to respond to the allegations on June 4.
Duterte, in the Netherlands on Tuesday, said her legal team is prepared to defend her while she continues to attend to the needs of her father, former president Rodrigo Duterte, who is being tried for crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
She said her legal team had been formed before her father was arrested on March 11 and brought to The Hague.
The House yesterday served the motion to the Office of the Vice President (OVP), officially notifying Duterte of the impeachment proceedings initiated against her.
A copy of the motion was furnished to the OVP by House Secretariat Staff at her office address on the 11th Floor of Robinsons Cybergate Plaza, Mandaluyong City.
The vice president said she has to remain in the Netherlands because she cannot leave her father there alone until his own legal team has been formed.
PRUDENCE
Escudero, at a forum yesterday, stressed the impeachment court has not been convened.
“On page 2 of the very motion they filed, they quoted the rules of the Senate that said ‘after the presentation of Articles of Impeachment and once the court is convened, the writ of summons shall be issued,’” he said at the Kapihan sa Manila Bay media forum.
Escudero reiterated nothing about the impeachment trial, which might start on July 30 based on his proposed timeline, if the impeachment court has not been convened, and this will be when regular sessions resume on June 2.
He also reiterated speeding up the process may just lead to irregularities which will give the camp of the vice president more reasons to question the proceedings.
“I would rather be more prudent and more closely faithful to what the law provides than go through this experimental procedures that they would want us to do at this point in time,” he said.
He said pushing him to immediately proceed with the trial due to the word “forthwith” is already tiring, stressing the term t does not necessarily mean “immediately” and will depend on “circumstances.”
Escudero reminded Rep. Marcelino Libanan, who led the prosecution team in filing the motion, that the House impeachment rules state that once an impeachment complaint is filed against any impeachable officer, it should “immediately” refer it to the House secretary general which will then immediately refer it to the House speaker.
He said the House did not do that.
The first three impeachment complaints against Duterte were filed in December last year but the House waited for a fourth one. The House eventually archived the first three complaints filed by various groups to give way to the majority’s complaint which was endorsed on February 5 by 215 lawmakers, exceeding by 113 signatories the constitutional requirement of one-third of all House members.
On the same day, the House transmitted the Articles of Impeachment to the Senate.
On February 18, Duterte questioned before the Supreme Court the validity and constitutionality of the fourth impeachment complaint, saying the House “deliberately circumvented” the one-year ban on filing impeachment complaints.
The Articles of Impeachment accuses Duterte of culpable violation of the Constitution, betrayal of public trust, graft and corruption and other high crimes.
Libanan said the House, by filing the motion, is “not pressuring” the Senate but only performing its constitutional mandate.
Libanan said their filings are “in accordance with their rules of procedure on impeachment proceedings which give an officer who is being sought to be impeached to answer in a period of ten days.”
Escudero said he has no plan to sit down with House members to tackle the impeachment complaint.
He said conducting the trial proper does not need to take place immediately, as he likened it to the case of former President Duterte, whose next appearance before the International Criminal Court trial chamber will be six months after his first appearance, or on September 23.
He said the ICC filed the case against the former president and set the hearing on September, noting the ICC has no recess. He said reiterated the impeachment trial will start in July, but the preliminaries, pre-trial procedures will be done in June considering that Congress is on recess.”
LEGAL TEAM
The vice president said they have not finished forming her father’s legal team.
“We are waiting for papers for other lawyers,” she said, adding that she still has to introduce the lawyer in charge to his siblings and to Cielito “Honeylet” Avanceña, her father’s partner.
“Para pwede na akong bumalik sa Pilipinas at bumalik na lang dito kapag kailangan (So I can go back to the Philippines and just return here if needed),” she said.
Iloilo Rep. Lorenz Defensor, a member of the House prosecution panel, reminded the Vice President that she also has a duty to face the allegations against her.
“Being the vice president, while you have a father to take care, you also have a nation to look after and a nation you have to see that you are accountable for your actions,” Defensor told Radyo 630.
Defensor said the case against the former president was filed based on the complaints of his fellow Filipinos whose loved ones were victims of his bloody war on drugs.
