Public’s due: Real trial

The looming impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte will likely mirror the proceedings against Chief Justice Renato Corona, who was ousted as head of the judiciary in 2012.

The Senate impeachment court convicted Corona 20-3 on a single article — betrayal of public trust and culpable violation of the Constitution — for failing to fully disclose his Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth.

That precedent makes the ongoing effort to block access to VP Duterte’s bank records a pivotal development.

Former Senate President Franklin Drilon, who was a senator-judge in both the landmark Estrada and Corona cases, holds that bank records have a track record of shattering comfortable assumptions of acquittal.

“Until the bank statements and records were revealed,” Drilon said, “the general view was that Corona would be acquitted — but the bank records changed that picture.”

Duterte now faces the same scrutiny over the massive Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC)-reported inflows and outflows that clash with her Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth filings that, for years, declared scant cash on hand or in the bank.

“You are supposed to report your assets,” Drilon insisted. Excuses that vast sums were merely “parked” or tucked under vague categories like “others” mock the law’s plain demand for honesty.

Six years of near-zero cash declarations, contradicted by actual banking flows, is hard to attribute to oversight. It looks like concealment.

Prejudgment by senator-judges undermines the process and constitutes a serious, recurring flaw in the trials.

Several senators have already signaled their strong inclinations, sometimes explicitly, before evidence is formally presented in the Senate impeachment court, echoing the criticism leveled during the Corona trial and earlier proceedings.

Drilon rejects the dodge that an impeachment “is a political process,” reasoning that politics does not license impunity.

The Constitution explicitly lifts bank secrecy for impeachment precisely to prevent officials from burying ill-gotten wealth where investigators cannot reach it.

Shielding such accounts would render accountability impossible. “All I have to do, if I were an impeachable officer, [is] deposit it all in the bank and nobody can prove anything,” Drilon contended.

The defense may count on nine Senate votes to block a conviction, yet Drilon reminds the judges who will constitute the court that the evidence could redo the arithmetic.

The House acted wisely by forwarding the articles and leaving the full evidentiary confrontation for the Senate, where the impeachment court wields the exclusive power to judge.

Technical objections to subpoenas and AMLC disclosures clash against the bank secrecy law’s clear exception for impeachment proceedings.

Duterte deserves her defense, but the Senate must not flinch from the records or facts that will be presented as evidence.

Public office demands an accounting. If the numbers do not add up, neither should the excuses.

The Senate’s duty is clear: open the books, weigh the evidence and deliver justice without fear or favor.

Vice President Duterte’s defense will have its day to explain the discrepancies.

The public’s right to accountability cannot be subordinated to claims of confidentiality that the Constitution itself rejects in impeachment cases.

Let the chips fall where they may.