Solon cites barrier to impeachment bid
“Creeping” impeachment that once led to the removal from office of a sitting president (Joseph Estrada in 2000) and a chief magistrate (Renato Corona in 2011) may no longer worry Chief Justice Ma. Lourdes Sereno and Commission on Elections (Comelec) Chairman Andres Bautista.
Contrary to the legal opinion aired by Mindoro Oriental Rep. Rey Umali, the impeachment cases may no longer be railroaded and elevated swiftly to the Senate even if 98 congressmen, comprising one-third of the House membership, will endorse it prior to referral to the Committee on Justice that Umali chairs.
Assistant Minority Leader and ABS Partylist Rep. Eugene De Vera said the impeachment rules approved by the House of Representatives have gotten rid of creeping impeachment schemes that may result in the removal from office of constitutionally-installed officials.
Umali claimed that automatically sending the complaints to the Senate impeachment court remains a possibility if endorsers reach 98 for each complaint within a period of 30 days since its filing.
However, De Vera cited Rule IV, Section 13, Paragraph 2 of the impeachment rules specifically providing that an impeachment complaint/resolution, “must, at the time of filing, be verified and sworn to before the Secretary General” by congressmen constituting one-third of the House membership.
“The word ‘must’ is mandatory. Hence, to automatically constitute into the Articles of Impeachment, the said 1/3 endorsement as verified and sworn to by the members should have been made at the time of filing before the Secretary General,” said De Vera, a lawyer.
De Vera added: “In the case of Chief Justice Ma. Lourdes Sereno, only 25 endorsed it at the time of filing and was now forwarded to the Speaker.”
He pointed out that 73 additional endorsers “at this point will not convert said complaint into the articles of impeachment.”
“It goes to the process of hearing it out before the Committee on Justice,” the opposition lawmaker stressed.
In the case of Bautista, only three congressmen – Deputy Speaker Gwendolyn Garcia (PDP-Laban, Cebu); Reps. Harry Roque (Kabayan Party list) and Abraham Tolentino (PDP-Laban, Cavite) – endorsed his impeachment.
De Vera admitted that Sereno and Bautista, who are among the country’s brightest legal minds, may question any attempt in the Lower House to fast track their impeachment by allowing congressmen to sign endorsements until the number reaches the minimum one-third vote required by the rules.
Earlier, Umali said endorsers to each complaint may still be accepted before Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez refers them to the Committee on Justice.
“The Speaker has the remainder of ten session days still to refer to the Committee on justice before impeachment proceedings can be considered initiated,” he told The Manila Bulletin.