MANILA, Philippines — The nation will witness history on Monday, July 6, as the Senate, sitting as Impeachment Court, will begin the trial of Sara Duterte, the first vice president to undergo an impeachment trial.
The trial will be held from Monday to Wednesday at 2 p.m.
Senate President Sherwin Gatchalian on Sunday said Day 1 of the trial will focus on preliminaries.
The prosecution and defense panels will give their opening statements.
Gatchalian said he will be the presiding officer amid debates, especially on social media, questioning his capacity to lead the trial since he is not a lawyer.
"I've said it before, under the rules, the Senate president will be presiding officer," Gatchalian said in Filipino and English.
"The actual trial will be on Tuesday. We will start to summon witnesses. This is also where we will witness the presentation of evidence," he said in a radio interview.
The senator said there are matters that will be resolved on Monday, particularly the issues raised during and after the pre-trial conference.
But he declined to discuss these matters. "I would not like to preempt. Of course, we will leave that to the senator-judges."
But he said that during the all-senators caucus on Friday, they had a long discussion on the court's custody of the "BIR box" which contains the tax records of Duterte and her husband, Manases Carpio.
"We discussed why it is with the Senate. So, tomorrow we will hear the decision of the court on that [issue]," Gatchalian said.
"But that is [supposed to be] evidence [against Duterte]. And the evidence should be in the custody of the prosecution or defense," he added.
