Futile resistance

Some senators are taking a dangerous course of open conflict with the Supreme Court (SC), as they have indicated their intention to convene an impeachment court to try Vice President Sara Duterte, despite the ruling that the complaints are unconstitutional.

They argued that the Senate, as the impeachment court under Article XI, Section 3(6), has the sole power to try and decide impeachment cases. The power, however, is not absolute and must align with the Constitution.

In its ruling, the SC indicated that the Senate did not acquire jurisdiction over the impeachment proceedings because the documents that would have initiated them had violated the Constitution. Thus, the Senate court lacks the basis to exist, and ignoring the SC decision would constitute a direct challenge to judicial review.

Defying a clear High Court ruling would be unprecedented. It does not serve any purpose to go into a battle with the final arbiter of the Constitution.

Imagine that each of the Senate court’s moves would be subjected to legal questions. The SC made it an essential part of its ruling to remind that a new impeachment complaint can be filed after 6 February 2026, but it should align with the Charter and not waste the government’s time or endanger the rule of law.

The unanimity of the ruling underscored the tribunal’s firm stance on the illegality of the process imposed on VP Duterte. According to the SC, the adjournment of the House session effectively terminated the three impeachment complaints, thereby making the fourth breach a constitutional restriction.

In his concurring opinion, Supreme Court Associate Justice Ramon Paul Hernando said the House of Representatives deliberately sought to circumvent the one-year bar rule.

“[T]he House abused its discretion when it tolerated and approved the Secretary General’s act of withholding action on the first three impeachment complaints,” Hernando’s opinion stated. It added that the House “methodically placed the three complaints in limbo.”

The House’s actions “clearly demonstrate a calculated and hastened effort to push the fourth impeachment complaint with deliberate speed and minimal scrutiny.”

“The move was as clever as it was iniquitous and a prime example of a technically legal but highly immoral maneuver, a mere subterfuge for political gain, for it exploited a weak point in our democratic institutions,” according to the magistrate.

The SC ruling indicated that the proceeding was invalid from the outset, which those seeking to defy it should take note of.

“The Articles of Impeachment, besides being barred, are also constitutionally infirm and therefore null and void ab initio,” according to the decision.

The court found that the House did not provide VP Duterte with the draft Articles of Impeachment and the evidence to support the allegations, which is a requirement for due process. The Vice President was denied the opportunity to be heard by the members of the House of Representatives.

The High Court, anticipating a likely struggle with Congress, offered a solution in its ruling, stating that a new complaint can be filed after the one-year bar has expired. What the SC was saying is for Congress to get the process straight by removing destructive politics as an ingredient in the ouster move.