Chiz explains ‘NO’ vote on lower conviction for VP

Impeachment Court Presiding Officer Chiz Escudero on Wednesday voted no on lowering the conviction threshold in the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte, reaffirming his July 6 ruling that the Constitution requires 16 votes for conviction.

Escudero was the lone senator to cast a dissenting vote to reverse his earlier decision, despite the absence of four of his colleagues. 

Thirteen senators voted in favor, while six—all from the minority led by Senator Alan Cayetano—did not participate in the voting, which was triggered by Senator Erwin Tulfo’s motion to revisit the threshold rule on 8 September.

Escudero emphasized that the Court’s interpretation would operate pro hac vice, or “for this occasion only,” and would not bind future impeachment proceedings.

“This has never happened before, and the Chair hopes that it shall never happen again,” he said, underscoring the extraordinary circumstances that led to the ruling.

Explaining his vote, Escudero said the impeachment court must apply Article XI, Section 3(6) of the 1987 Charter according to its plain language.

“The Chair stands by his July 6 ruling. Article XI, Section 3(6) of the Constitution must be given its plain and literal meaning. The Chair finds no basis in the constitutional text for interpreting it otherwise,” Escudero told the Senate sitting as an impeachment court.

He cited four reasons for rejecting alternative interpretations of the voting requirement.

First, Escudero noted that the word “present” was intentionally omitted from the 1987 Philippine Constitution, even though it appeared in the U.S. version from which the provision was derived.

“The word ‘present’ was omitted from the 1935 Constitution, even if it was originally contained in the first complete draft of the 1934 Constitutional Convention. And it was never restored in the 1973 nor the 1987 Constitutions,” he noted.

“In other words, the word ‘present’ was intentionally omitted and has remained absent from our Constitution ever since. What the Constitution has omitted, for me, cannot now be restored by interpretation,” he added.

Second, Escudero pointed out that Senate membership in the Senate should not be confused with a senator’s ability or eligibility to vote. Absence or incapacity, he said, does not alter the fact that the Senate is composed of 24 members, as mandated by Article VI, Section 2.

Third, he warned that lowering the denominator would create fractional votes and what he described as absurd outcomes. Reducing the denominator one senator at a time, he explained, would make conviction easier to secure than acquittal—a result the framers of the Charter could not have intended.

Escudero added that if the denominator were reduced to as few as four members from 24 senators, the number of votes needed to convict would fall more often than the number needed to acquit. “The conviction threshold falls 13 times, while the acquittal threshold falls only seven times. In other words, a variable denominator makes it easier to secure a judgement of conviction compared to a judgement of acquittal.”

Fourth, Escudero invoked the principle of “in dubio pro reo,” which directs that genuine doubt be resolved in favor of the accused. He said conviction should not be made easier by implication or inference when constitutional doubt remains.

“Terminating an elected mandate before the end of its term is among the most drastic acts our constitutional democracy can undertake. Therefore, when the Constitution fixes the conditions and number for imposing a judgment of conviction, those conditions should not be relaxed by implication, nor should the number rise or fall according to the contingencies of the day,” he said.

Cayetano, his sister, Senator Pia Cayetano and their peers in the minority bloc—Bong Go, Imee Marcos, Robin Padilla, and Camille Villar—boycotted the vote by refusing to return to the session hall after a 30-minute lunch break, in protest of the lowering of the conviction threshold. 

Only Senator Mark Villar, of the seven present minority, voted in favor of reversing the 6 July ruling.