Sotto on taking sides: I’m not like my colleagues!

Senate Minority Leader Vicente “Tito” Sotto III on Monday took a swipe at Senate President Francis “Chiz” Escudero for seemingly targeting him after Sotto reacted to proposals for revising the Philippine Constitution following the archiving of the articles of impeachment against Vice President Sara Duterte.

Escudero, in his official X account, advised Sotto to take it easy when Sotto was quoted in a news report as saying he “would be in favor of revising the Constitution should the Supreme Court decide with finality to junk VP Sara’s impeachment.”

Escudero wrote: “Easy lang po… kinampihan na nga po ninyo ang impeachment ng HOR at ni Speaker Martin maski sabi ng SC UNCONSTITUTIONAL. Ngayon naman po kinakampihan na din nyo ang ChaCha ng HOR at ni Speaker Romualdez.”

With this, Sotto struck back and said: “What I said was, if the SC ruling stands as is and the Constitution is amended by merely a SC decision, then I will consider supporting a Constuent Assembly or a Constitutional Convention to rewrite Article XI of the Constitution because the requirements written in the SC decision is impossible to meet.”

“Wala akong kinakampihan tulad nila. Ang kinakampihan ko ay ang Constitution,” Sotto stressed.

On Aug. 6, 19 Senate lawmakers voted yes to archive the articles of impeachment against Vice President Duterte, while Senators Bam Aquino, Risa Hontiveros, Kiko Pangilinan, and Vicente Sotto III voted ‘no,’ with Lacson abstaining from casting his vote.