By installing a new Speaker in former President and Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, the members of the House of Representatives may have wittingly or unwittingly made President Rodrigo Duterte vulnerable to impeachment.

On Monday, 184 members of the House staged a rump session and voted Arroyo as the new Speaker, replacing Davao del Norte 1st District Rep. Pantaleon Alvarez, an event that Sen. Panfilo Lacson described as an “awkward, low, ugly and disgraceful sight.”

With his own brand of leadership, Alvarez—a close friend of Duterte—imposed discipline on the House that the problem on lack of quorum practically disappeared, participation in committee hearings perked up and priority legislation were acted with dispatch.

Alvarez, secretary general of the ruling Partido ng Demokratikong Pilipino, also recruited key members to the party’s fold and consolidated control over the House, ensuring the stability of Duterte’s presidency against any threat of impeachment.

Last year, the House dismissed the impeachment complaint filed by Magdalo Rep. Gary Alejano against Duterte.

But given Arroyo’s character and history of transactional politics, one characterized by horse-trading, Duterte’s impeachment is no longer a remote possibility.

Transactional politics was how some observers described

Arroyo’s presidency, particularly in pardoning her predecessor Joseph Estrada,

who was convicted of the crime of plunder. They said this was meant to defuse the tension faced by the Arroyo administration for the national broadband network deal and the scandal stirred by her “cash gifts” to lawmakers.

It would not be inconceivable for Arroyo to relent to efforts by the enemies of Duterte administration to impeach the President if that would mean her continued grip on political power.

This is especially true as some of the prime movers of Alvarez’s ouster are identified with the so-called Yellow Forces, including former Speaker Feliciano Belmonte, Jr. and Rep. Jorge Banal of the Liberal Party which include among its stalwarts Vice President Leni Robredo.

While it is true that the LP bloc abstained from the voting to elect Arroyo as the new Speaker, their body language shown in the video footage of the event clearly evidenced that the unfolding event is immensely beneficial to their interests.

In fact, the ouster of Alvarez may have been engineered as a modern-day Iliad, the story of the destruction of the city with the ingenious ploy of using a tactic now known as the Trojan Horse.

Was it phase one of the plan to ingratiate themselves with President Duterte and gain his trust and lay down the ground for a power grab that Arroyo and Belmonte were often seen accompanying him in his local and foreign trips?

But considering that Arroyo was voted into power by 184 out of the total of 292 congressmen, or just 36 over the required one-half plus one of the total number of the congressmen to acquire a majority, her hold to power is still shaky.

Under the prevailing circumstances that led to the ouster of Alvarez and Arroyo’s election as new Speaker of the House of Representatives the Yellows may have found an opening for the impeachment of Duterte to regain lost power.

All that is needed for Duterte to be impeached is a vote of at least one third of the members of the House.

This scenario, worrisome to all those hoping for the realization of meaningful changes promised by Duterte, could become all too real with Arroyo at the helm of the House.

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