THE Senate last night voted to archive the impeachment case against Vice President Sara Duterte with a vote of 19 in favor, four against, and one abstention.
The senators who voted “yes” to archive the case mainly said it was out of respect to the Supreme Court that declared the complaint null and void ab initio in a decision issued on July 25.
The vote came after a motion of Senate minority leader Vicente Sotto III seeking to “table” the amended motion of Sen. Rodante Marcoleta to dismiss the case was lost with a vote of 19 against, five in favor, with no abstentions.
Laying a motion on the table is a parliamentary procedure used to temporarily postpone a matter under consideration, thus allowing the group to address a more urgent matter or to allow for a short break in the discussion.
Those who voted “no” were Senators Sotto, Risa Hontiveros, Francis Pangilinan, and Paolo Benigno Aquino.
Sen. Panfilo Lacson abstained, saying he would want to wait for the Supreme Court’s final ruling on the motion for reconsideration filed by the House of Representatives on Monday.
He said he would have voted “yes” to the amended motion of Marcoleta “because I have always maintained that we must respect and not disobey the Supreme Court.”
But since the House’s appeal is still pending, the SC’s July 25 decision is not final until the tribunal rules on the House’s motion with finality.
“That being said, I would rather wait, not preempt the final ruling of the High Court. It is for these reasons that I abstain, Mr. President,” he said.
Once archived, Senate President Francis Escudero said, the Articles of Impeachment can be discussed any time again, on the vote of majority senators.
Escudero said the impeachment complaint against former president Joseph Estrada was also archived due to EDSA 2, while the same was done in the case of former Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez after she resigned from her post while the trial was ongoing.
MOTION TO DISMISS
Marcoleta initially moved to dismiss the impeachment complaint, but Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano suggested that it be amended so the motion would be to just archive the case, to which the former agreed.
Marcoleta, in a privilege speech, moved for the dismissal based on the SC decision which he said is “immediately executory” and therefore, the Senate must abide by its ruling.
He added the sole power of the Senate to try and decide impeachment cases was not taken away from it.
He cited a number of instances when, he said, the House violated its own rules, thus the impeachment complaint should be immediately dismissed. These include the House violating the one-year bar rule, failure of the House to include the complaint in its order of business, failure to refer the complaint to the appropriate committee where the vice president would have been given the right to defend herself.
“The Supreme Court has already spoken — the final arbiter of the law. It ruled the complaint unconstitutional, lacking in initiative, and violative of due process. The Senate never acquired jurisdiction over the matter. The decision is immediately executory. On that note, Mr. President, I respectfully move that the impeachment complaint be dismissed,” Marcoleta said as he ended his privilege speech.
“They (House) transmitted to the Senate without requiring themselves to observe another provision of their own rules,” he added.
He said the impeachment complaint should have been done in accordance with the rules.
“You want to impeach the Vice President? Do it the right way,” he said.
‘UNANIMOUS MISTAKE’
Sotto said the Senate should have first waited for the Supreme Court to come up with its decision on the motion for reconsideration before they make any move on the complaint.
Sotto said the SC decision is not yet final as he warned that dismissing the case prematurely could have implications should the high court reverses its ruling.
“A case decided unanimously does not mean that it is infallible. For all we know, it is a unanimous mistake, that again can be corrected by setting aside and reversing prior announcements,” Sotto said referring to the July 25 unanimous decision
“Let us allow and give chance to the Supreme Court to rectify its decision which contains clear and blatant errors, for their sake and for future impeachment proceedings. Let us not dismiss forthwith,” he added.
Sotto said there have been instances when the SC reversed its decision, thus, it would be better to just wait for the high court to issue its final ruling.
Sotto also disputed the SC interpretation of adjournment, saying that February 5 was not the day when the 19th Congress was terminated since the last session day was on June 11. Congress adjourned sine die on June 13.
February 5 was the last session day when Congress took a break for the midterm elections. It was also the day when the House transmitted the Articles of Impeachment to the Senate.
Sotto said the SC literally amended the Constitution by removing the third mode of initiating impeachment complaints.
“If the Supreme Court is now changing the meaning of ‘initiating’, then at the very least, it should be applied prospectively,” he said, adding that such is a violation of the Doctrine of Operatve Facts, “thus voiding as well the impeachment proceedings of former president Estrada and Chief Justice Renato Corona.
“They did not interpret the Constitution, they amended it…So, I was hoping to table it, to table the motion so we can afford, let us give them this opportunity for the benefit of future impeachment processes and to uphold the clear mandate of the 1987 Constitution. All we need to do was wait a little,” he added.
JURISDICTION
He said the Senate has already assumed jurisdiction over the impeachment complaint since the senators during the 19th Congress convened as an impeachment court and has sent out summons to the defense and prosecution teams.
Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano interjected to amend Marcoleta’s initial motion to dismiss the impeachment complaint and adhere to the SC decision and archive it, to which Sotto agreed but they will adhere “until the Supreme Court comes up with its final decision on the case.”
Escudero ruled that they first act on the motion of Sotto, and if it is lost, they will vote on the amended motion of Marcoleta. He clarified that the vote will be for Marcoleta’s motion, not for the junking of the Articles of Impeachment.
“There is a motion to vote on the motion of Senator Sotto to lay on the table the motion of Sen. Marcoleta for taking the Articles of Impeachment vis-à-vis and in the light of the Supreme Court decision of July 25, 2025. To explain, a yes, affirmative, or aye vote supports the motion of the honorable minority leader and it therefore means that we will not act on the motion of Sen. Marcoleta today,” Escudero said.
Aside from Sotto, the other senators who voted in the affirmative on the minority leader’s motion were Hontiveros, Aquino, Lacson, and Pangilinan. The rest of the 19 senators registered a negative vote.
After the first voting, majority leader Joel Villanueva moved to archive the impeachment complaint.
“I move to transfer the Articles of Impeachment in relation to case number 003-2025 entitled in the matter of impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Zimmerman Duterte to the archives,” Villanueva said.
Sotto objected, saying that they should vote on it.
RUSH
At the House before the start of the Senate session, prosecution panel spokesperson Antonio Audie Bucoy said the Senate was now rushing to dismiss the Articles of Impeachment after taking its own sweet time since February 5, when the complaint was transmitted by the House after 215 lawmakers signed it.
“It will only show that they’re (Senate) really rushing. They want to finish it when they did not rush even if the Constitution states that the trial shall be held ‘forthwith,’” he told a press conference in Filipino before the Senate tackled the matter on the floor.
Bucoy said since the Supreme Court has yet to resolve the motion for reconsideration filed by the House on Monday, the Senate was just “wasting time” deciding on whether to dismiss the case.
He said the SC ruling, while it was executory, is not yet final.
Bucoy, however, said the Senate can revive the case if the High Court will reverse its decision in favor of the House’s appeal.
Bucoy also said the SC has made it a lot more difficult to impeach high-ranking public officials by imposing additional, previously nonexistent constitutional requirements which he said effectively weakens the impeachment process, a key mechanism for exacting accountability from public officials.
Among the new procedural burdens imposed by the Tribunal is the requirement for the House to conduct a collective deliberation or plenary debate before transmitting a complaint to the Senate even when the Constitution states that a complaint can be transmitted to the Senate for trial once it is signed by one-third of the members of the House.
The decision also requires all pieces of evidence to be attached to the complaint and distributed to every member of the House even if it is not in the Constitution.
“Sad to say, ‘yung accountability po nawalan ng ngipin kung susundin natin ang naging decision ng Supreme Court (the process of seeking accountability has lost its teeth if we follow the Supreme Court’s decision),” he said. – With Wendell Vigilia
