The House quad committee will proceed with its supposedly canceled hearing on Wednesday following a "confrontation" threat from the camp of former president Rodrigo Duterte.
The mega panel announced on Tuesday that it will move the 11th hearing to 21 November citing a lack of time to vet a set of new witnesses.
Panel chairperson Ace Barbers said a notice of cancellation was sent out to the invited resource persons, including Duterte’s legal counsel, Martin Delgra III, as early as Monday.
However, Duterte's former mouthpiece, Salvador Panelo, said that they will still proceed to the House of Representatives to ask lawmakers as to why there was a last-minute postponement.
“(Former) PRRD (President Rodrigo Roa Duterte) and I will go to Batasang Pambansa tomorrow at 10:00 am and confront the Quad Committee members why, after demanding his presence and accepting their invitation and coming here last night, they will just cancel it without prior notice," Panelo said on Monday.
Panelo added that Duterte would also ask the committee to schedule a 10-day marathon hearing.
Barbers maintained that they informed Duterte's camp in all "forms of communication" about the inquiry's cancellation but received no response as of Tuesday.
Nevertheless, the panel announced that the hearing would push through and that an "urgent notice” cascaded to the members of the committee.
Duterte repeatedly skipped the previous quad comm probes, citing sickness and raising doubts about the committee’s intentions, calling it a “ploy aimed to indict him for crimes he did not commit.”
But House lawmakers are headstrong in inviting him, asserting the need to face the severe allegations leveled against him and justice for the victims of his bloody drug war.
Duterte, who admitted under oath in a Senate probe that he was the sole responsible for the massive killings of his war on drugs, faces intense scrutiny for reported human rights abuses, including the deaths of thousands, many from the poorest communities.