Capricious

The impeachment effort against Sara Duterte was born of politics. It will die of politics.

One senator described the impeachment effort as functionally dismissed.

There is simply no material time for the 19th Congress to hold a half-respectable trial involving superfluous allegations. There is enough basis to question the adequacy of the process leading to the filing of the impeachment complaint. By the operation of its own rules, the Senate of the 20th Congress may simply relegate this distasteful matter to the dustbin of history.

The only question left at this point is how to dispose of this unwanted political trouble in the most graceful manner possible. Every hard-nosed politician knows in his bones that this impeachment effort has lost its political moment. It has become an unwanted political offspring that no one wants to father.

Except the leftist groups. They are constantly scavenging for issues that could make them matter. They need political chaos to thrive on.

The House of Representatives indulged in this impeachment exercise for reasons other than good governance. Toby Tiangco said as much. After working so hard to realign the 2025 budget to yield the pork the politicians want, the legislators needed the leverage to force the Executive branch to release the funds. They mistakenly chose impeachment as the method to win leverage. It is now clear that was a gross miscalculation.

What the House won was public disdain: first by so brazenly commandeering the budget and then by playing around with impeachment to extract the funds they appropriated for themselves. This only reinforced the perception this particular chamber is a criminal enterprise.

The impeachment complaint was filed with the expectation this would weaken Sara Duterte’s endorsement power in time for the midterm elections. It achieved the exact opposite.

More than that, it took a toll on the popularity of the BBM administration. Now the President has to do all sorts of populist cartwheels to stop the slide in his approval ratings. He has taken sudden interest in showing up at malls and commuter trains to bond with ordinary mortals. He was last seen taking credit for the improvements at the Manila airport – all of which are byproducts of the decision to privatize operations of this gateway.

The administration has nothing to gain from supporting the impeachment effort. It has eroded public support, especially from Mindanao and the Visayas. By allowing the impeachment effort to simmer longer, the ruling coalition courts making Sara a martyr and alienating voters in the south.

Besides, the administration now realizes the impeachment was filed precisely to pressure the Executive branch to release the congressional insertions. BBM was put at the treacherous end of the political knife.

The Senate has the most to lose – politically and institutionally – from proceeding with this impeachment charade.

The impeachment complaint, rushed to the Senate with motorcycle escorts and all, was dead on arrival. This was political garbage dumped on the senators so that they reap the political whirlwind while the congressmen collect the pork.

In all recent impeachment carnivals, the Senate suffered as an institution.

The Senate trial of Joseph Estrada was so bungled it produced an insurrection (or opened the door to a coup, by one view). Estrada lost the presidency. The Senate lost credibility. Filipino politics lost predictability.

The impeachment of Chief Justice Renato Corona stands a monument to injustice. That process began from sheer political capriciousness. It ended up destroying a magistrate by trumped up charges (the Supreme Court later found these was no basis for accusing Corona of ill-gotten wealth). Poor Rene Corona could not live down and could not outlive the cruelty inflicted on him. The Senate could not live down the impression it was generously bribed by the Noynoy administration.

The impeachment of Chief Justice Sereno, too, arose from sheer political vanity. She was impeached because the politicians thought they could do it. She lost her post on charges too obscure to be remembered by the public.

Former Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez was smarter. Sensing the political winds were not in her favor, she resigned her post before an impeachment trial could be convened. She survived to continue her public service by other means.

The senators will be suckers if they accept the political trash dumped on them by the congressmen. Like Pontius Pilate, the House leadership has washed its hands of the matter. The complaint has been signed and forwarded. It is for the senators to mount the crucifixion.

The impeachment nobody wants has become entirely a Senate problem. The chamber has been set up to reap the scorn.

If the senators fail to find a way to relieve themselves of the political trash dumped on them by the wily congressmen, they will end up with a disgraceful carnival on their hands. No political gain will be made by the senators if they hold a trial impossible to complete and could very well be repudiated by the next Congress.

Those with political ambitions for 2028 court the danger of losing the southern vote (not to mention the command votes of groups such as the INC). Those who want this trial to proceed are in it for its entertainment value. The peril of bungling this whole process, given the very tight timetable, is high.

No one would want to be in Chiz Escudero’s shoes at this time.