IN a vexing display of constitutional ignorance and disguised malicious intent (by a few members who initiated the violation), the Senate impeachment court amended the 1987 Constitution, particularly altering the language of the Constitution relative to the constitutional command requiring two-thirds of all 24 senators to convict an impeachable officer in an impeachment proceeding.
The said violation occurred when 13 of its members voted to reduce the threshold number required to adjudge the respondent, Vice President Sara Zimmerman Duterte, guilty of the impeachable complaint lodged against her.
It violated the clear, simple and unambiguous constitutional provision that orders, “No person shall be convicted without the concurrence of all the Members of the Senate.”
It likewise violated the methods by which an amendment or revision of the Constitution can be made, e.g., calling a constitutional convention, convening a constituent assembly or a calling a people’s initiative.
It did so, because the brains behind the vicious plan to oust VP Sara from her post, disqualify her from running for president in 2028, and perpetually ban her from any elective and appointive public office could not remove her fair and square under an impeachment process to which the Constitution requires 16 senators voting for conviction. The requisite number 16 is insurmountable despite their devious implementation of jailing senators by filing plunder charges against them, intimidating other senators with threatened suits in connection with the corruption-tainted flood control projects, threatening to enforce an unlawful warrant of arrest issued by a foreign court that has no jurisdiction over this country and its citizens against two senators, and harassing the rest with all sorts of criminal charges. They could not muster the magic number 16 to silence and obliterate the stumbling block to their continued stay in power and inability to win over Sara in the next presidential elections.
The continuing and active threat against the liberty of those who are called by the Constitution to render judgment, whether they are in the majority or in the minority, gave birth to somersaulting, disloyalty and blind obedience, resulting in the anomalous fiasco and impending constitutional crisis.
The justifications for the constitutional transgressions insult not only the legal mind but the citizenry who are already disgusted by a failed governance of the powers-that-be and their impotence at responding to the needs of the people that have aggravated their continued suffering and restlessness.
One excuse is that they have not really amended the Constitution and removed the two-thirds vote, that they were just interpreting the said provision and that if the two senators who are either abroad or whose whereabouts are unknown. And those in jail would appear in the Senate on voting day, they would be allowed to vote.
Their justification is pure deception and contradiction.
The Constitution’s command to render a valid conviction is to cast a two-thirds votes of all the members of the Senate. Since there are 24 senators elected, two-thirds of that would be 16 senators voting for conviction. The constitutional provision in question is clear, simple, unambiguous and definitive. No qualification is stated as to any circumstance that would change the baseline of 24 senators. The impeachment court in blatant violation of the unequivocal language of the Constitution ruled that those senators who are mentally and physically unfit, who are fugitives from justice or whose whereabouts are unknown, those who are in jail and are suspended to perform their duties or are facing criminal charges that deprive them of their liberty will not be included in the computation in getting the two-thirds vote. Hence, since four of the senators fall in those categories, namely Loren Legarda, Ronald dela Rosa, Jinggoy Estrada and Rodante Marcoleta, they have therefore been removed from the equation, thus reducing the base of 24 senators to only 20, which means the conviction votes will be reduced to 14 because two-thirds of 20 is 14. Such change altered the constitutionally required conviction votes of 16 senators to 14. The alteration is an amendment to the unqualified required number of conviction votes.
The impeachment court’s alteration or amendment of the constitutional provision is ultra vires or unconstitutional because the hearing tribunal is not vested with the power to amend any or all parts of the Constitution. The Constitution outlines the methods by which any amendment or revision can be made, and these are by way of a constitutional convention, Congress convening as a constituent assembly, and a people’s initiative. Outside of those said modes, any alteration or amendment thereof is a constitutional transgression. Such act of the impeachment court was done with grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction and subject to judicial scrutiny.
The excuse that the impeachment court being sui generis or a class of its own, and is the sole entity given the exclusive mandate to hear and decide impeachment complaints and, therefore, can add to its own internal rules how the judgment of conviction is to be rendered is utterly wrong. While the impeachment court may create its own procedures, the same cannot go against an express provision requiring to perform a particular act in accordance with how that action is to be enforced. It cannot impose a rule that puts circumstances not expressly mentioned by the Constitution which changes the complexion of a constitutional process. Such change is in derogation of the right to due process accorded to VP Sara by constitutional fiat.
The argument that the provision on the threshold voting must not be inflexible and should adjust to the realities of the times is wrongly premised because the said provision is not inflexible. The Constitution provides the circumstances by which the baseline of 24 senators can be changed, e.g., death or resignation or expulsion of a senator in accordance with law. The occurrence of any of the aforementioned circumstances will automatically change the base of 24 senators to the number of remaining senators. As for instance, if four senators die, resign or expelled. The base becomes 20 senators, and two-thirds of 24 is 14. Outside of those circumstances, the voting requirement of two-thirds of 24 senators is constant.
In an attempt to cover up the obvious unconstitutional amendment, they argue that should Legarda, dela Rosa, Estrada and Marcoleta appear on the voting day on the conviction or acquittal of VP Sara, they will be allowed to participate and vote.
This is the contradiction and deception. They are both laughable and outrageous. The illegal amendment targeted the four senators who are unable to attend the impeachment hearing so they could lower the number of votes required for conviction yet they say with tongue in cheek that any of them would be allowed if they attend for the voting! They know for a fact that they cannot, the brains behind their disabling situation made sure of that. These manipulators will stop at nothing to remove VP Sara from her position and permanently ban her from running for president in 2028, which she will surely win, as well as holding any elective or appointive office.
The constitutional violation is so blatant and glaring that the people are feeling outrageously wronged and seething with revolting anger.
