House used ‘highly immoral maneuver' in VP Sara impeachment
Hernando was one of the 13 justices who voted on Friday to strike down the impeachment complaint pending before the Senate, ruling that it violated the constitutional protection against multiple impeachment proceedings against the same official in a single year.
According to the SC, the effective termination of the three impeachment complaints following the adjournment of session barred the fourth impeachment complaint, which was endorsed by more than 200 congressmen on February 5.
''[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 said in his concurring opinion.
''The totality of attendant circumstances reveals the true nature of the House's action: to circumvent the one-year bar rule in order to fabricate a superficially legal strategy and make the fourth complaint viable. 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,'' he added.
He said the House Secretary General's argument that the one-year bar rule did not apply since the first three complaints were never referred to the House Committee on Justice was ''an excuse so lame and convenient that it is extremely difficult to ignore the impunity that comes with it.''
However, ''one may take the unpopular perspective that the House of Representatives' seeming inaction on the first three impeachment complaints served as a mantle of protection to VP Duterte and saved her from the burden of having to answer all allegations against her all at once,'' said Associate Justice Rodil Zalameda.
Associate Justice Samuel Gaerlan, for his part, said that Duterte was not given due process in the course of the impeachment proceedings in the House.
''Here, as admitted by the House in their compliance before the Court, VP Sara was not given the opportunity to be heard in relation to the fourth Articles of Impeachment transmitted to the Senate. The House posits that neither the Constitution nor the House Rules imposes any requirement of prior opportunity to be heard,'' Gaerlan said in his concurring opinion.
''[T]he fundamental right to due process applies in all proceedings. Impeachment is not an exception,'' he added.
''[D]ue to the House's violation of VP Sara's right to due process, the fourth Articles of Impeachment is null and void.''
Associate Justice Jhosep Lopez said that while the Constitution allows the direct filing of an impeachment complaint upon the endorsement of at least one-third of all House members, ''this expedited process must not come at the expense of the respondent public official's constitutional rights.''
Both Hernando and Associate Justice Henri Jean Paul Inting opined that the Senate of the 20th Congress, which opens on July 28, could no longer act on the impeachment complaint.
Inting said the Articles of Impeachment that were transmitted by the 19th Congress were 'terminated and rendered inefficacious with the expiration of the term of the 19th Congress on June 30, 2025.''
''I]f the Senate of the 20th Congress is allowed to continue with the trial on the subject impeachment complaint, it would have to proceed based on the Articles of Impeachment by the House that no longer exists,'' he said. ''Such a situation is tantamount to the creation of an irrepealable statute, which is constitutionally impermissible.''
Hernando said the newly elected Congress could not be bound by the actions of the previous Congress.
''The fourth impeachment complaint already transmitted and pending before the Senate of the 19th Congress, as the Senate had already convened as an impeachment court, is likewise terminated by reason of the expiration of the term of the 19th Congress,'' he said.
Duterte was accused of betrayal of public trust, culpable violation of the constitution, graft and corruption, and other high crimes.
The charges included allegations of misusing confidential funds and threatening to have Speaker Martin Romualdez, First Lady Liza Araneta-Marcos, and President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. assassinated if she was killed.
The Vice President has denied the allegations.
The SC said that it is not absolving Duterte from any of the charges, and an impeachment complaint can still be filed starting February 6, 2026. —VBL, GMA Integrated News
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