By Lane Afable, News Editor
House Justice Committee Chair Batangas Rep. Gerville Luistro charged that the camp of Vice President Sara Z. Duterte appears to effectively concede that the impeachment case will go to trial at the Senate.
This as defense counsels of Vice President Duterte acknowledged that the House Committee on Justice is likely to vote to find probable cause in the impeachment complaints ahead of the final hearing on April 29, especially since the Vice President refused to address the allegations.
“It appears to me, doon sa kanilang press con, they are acknowledging already that this will be reaching a trial. Kasi, they’re claiming an opportunity to scrutinize, they’re claiming an opportunity to cross examine dahil kulang at malabo pa daw,” Luistro said.
“Well, it seems to me that they are joining the position of the justice committee that trial is really necessary. But that will happen, of course, after the determination of probable cause,” he added.
Luistro stressed that the threshold for establishing probable cause is low and requires only sufficient justification to proceed to trial and not a finding of guilt or not.
On the alleged confidential funds misuse allegation, Luistro noted that the Commission on Audit (COA) has already issued a final ruling and ordered Duterte to return the P73 million, which is part of the P125 million spent in just 11 days in December 2022.
This is aside from the P375 million in confidential funds spent from February to September 2023, which COA also disallowed. Duterte can still appeal this decision.
On the charge of unexplained wealth, Luistro noted the report of the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) about the P6.7 billion worth of covered and suspicious transactions in the accounts of Duterte and her husband, Manases Carpio, which appears inconsistent with her Statement of Assets Liabilities and Net Worth (SALN) declaration.
If the P6.7 billion in transactions cannot be traced to legitimate sources, Luistro said, the committee has sufficient basis to find a possibility of unexplained wealth.
The Batangas solon added that Duterte did not declare any cash on hand and in the bank in her SALN from 2019 to 2024.
Luistro added that the allegations of former Sen. Antonio Trillanes about deposits in Duterte’s account were reflected in the AMLC report. Trillanes claimed that these were proceeds from the illegal drug trade.
Duterte’s lawyers claimed that the Vice President did declare her cash on hand and in the banks under SALN’s “Others”.
Luistro said this only reinforces her earlier point that the Duterte camp is effectively conceding that there will be a trial in the Senate.
“So presenting these items, the cash and the deposit in bank in other items such as “Others” will be probing already, will require cross-examination already.
So it is as if they’re saying, ‘Let’s go to trial so that we can explain why naka-zero declaration ang cash, naka-zero declaration bank deposit because the thing is they were incorporated in the item ‘Others’,’” Luistro said.
“You will be going beyond what appears, the face value of the documents. So let’s go to trial. That’s the message that I got from the press con of the defense team,” she added.
On April 29, the Committee on Justice will conduct a hearing to tackle the alleged threat made by Duterte against President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., First Lady Liza Araneta Marcos, and former Speaker Ferdinand Martin Romualdez, and the issue of whether the panel should open the tax records of Duterte and her husband.
The committee also plans to vote on whether the impeachment complaints have probable cause and should be elevated to the Senate for trial.
