Mindanao lawyers to Sara Duterte: Impeachment is about accountability
Vice President Sara Duterte — GRIG C. MONTEGRANDE
DAVAO CITY — Lawyers in Mindanao have slammed Vice President Sara Duterte’s remark that impeachment is not about accountability, saying she “misses” the point of the 1987 Constitution.
Duterte made the remark on Monday in response to the business sector’s appeal for the Senate to promptly begin the impeachment trial, emphasizing the need to uphold public accountability and boost business confidence.
She said foreign direct investments (FDI) in the country are already declining and asserted that she should not be blamed for the economy’s downturn.
“This (impeachment trial) is not [about] accountability because [in an] impeachment [trial] there are only two penalties: removal from office and perpetual disqualification from government service. Impeachment is a removal process of an impeachable officer. If they really want accountability, they can file cases in court,” Duterte said.
READ: Enrile: It seems Sara Duterte doesn’t want to face impeachment trial
Her remarks drew reactions from lawyers at the Ateneo Public Interest and Legal Advocacy (Apila) Center and the Union of Peoples’ Lawyers in Mindanao (UPLM).
“(Her statement) that those who seek accountability should just file cases in court, misses a fundamental point of constitutional design,” said lawyer Romeo Cabarde Jr., director of Apila, in a message to Inquirer.
“The Constitution provides impeachment precisely because not all abuses of public officials can be addressed through the regular courts. The impeachment process is the people’s first line of defense against high-ranking officials who may be unfit to serve, even if they have not yet been convicted of a crime,” he added.
For lawyer Joel Mahinay, vice chair of UPLM, “It is difficult to fathom where the vice president based her claim or theory that the impeachment is not about accountability.”
“We must all remember that the impeachment of selective few high-ranking officials of the government is indicated or discussed in a specific article of the Constitution,” he added.
He cited Article XI on the Accountability of Public Officers, Section 1 of which provided that, “Public office is a public trust. Public officers and employees must, at all times, be accountable to the people.”
Cabarde said impeachment is “not about private grievances—it is about public accountability and constitutional integrity.”
He also clarified that impeachment and court cases are not mutually exclusive, as the Constitution wisely provides multiple layers of accountability: judicial, administrative, and political.
“To suggest that only the courts should be used ignores the special role that Congress plays in defending democratic institutions,” Cabarde said.
“Let’s not reduce accountability to just legal technicalities. Impeachment is where law meets leadership ethics, and where public trust is put on trial,” he added.
Mahinay said Duterte’s impeachment trial is clearly about accountability.
“The purpose of the impeachment is to deter abuses of power, while the purpose of the penalty in criminal cases is to punish the offenders by imprisonment, thus the protection of society from criminals,” he added.
He explained that while there is no imprisonment penalty in impeachment, the convict in criminal cases is made to pay by restoring the amount plundered or returning the amount stolen.
“Clearly, impeachment and criminal prosecution are two different proceedings with different purposes and consequences,” he added.
In a forum at a university here, lawyer Arvin Dexter Lopoz, spokesperson of the UPLM, explained that impeachment is the “most significant accountability mechanism in the country’s democracy” provided by the Constitution to protect the people from abuse of power.
He said it covers fewer than 50 special government positions, including the president, the vice president, members of the Supreme Court, the Ombudsman, and officials of constitutional commissions such as the Commission on Elections, the Commission on Audit, and the Civil Service Commission.
Although impeachment is political in nature, officials cannot evade their accountability to the people, said Mahinay. He explained that the rule of law should not be subordinated to political interests, warning that doing so could undermine the country’s democracy.
Cabarde agreed with Lopoz that impeachment is a constitutional accountability mechanism, stressing that “to undermine or delay it is to deny the people their right to demand responsibility from those who hold the highest offices of power.”/mcm
