AS Frank Sinatra’s iconic song “Let Me Try Again” goes, the notoriously discredited House of Representatives has once again launched an impeachment process against Vice President Sara Zimmerman Duterte — Inday Sara to her millions of followers — following the end of the one-year bar after the Supreme Court ruled her impeachment last year as unconstitutional.
Desperately trying once more to oust her from office and disqualify her from the 2028 presidential elections, the politicians behind the derailment move have marshaled their resources under the baton of the political conductor, hoping at this time they will succeed in destroying the threat to their continued stay in power and their plunderous assault on the nation’s wealth and resources.
Inday Sara, the heir to the Duterte legacy — left behind by a beloved former president, with a historic and unprecedented people’s acceptance, currently incarcerated at the detention center of the International Criminal Court (ICC) at The Hague, Netherlands, isolated from the rest of the world, but millions of Filipinos expressing their solidarity with him even as hundreds of them stand vigil near the ICC detention cell every day for a year now — has offered her life and soul to continue her father’s “tapang at malasakit” (courage and compassion) brand of governance, a governing philosophy of strong, decisive enforcement of the law and genuine concern for the people’s welfare.
In announcing her presidential run, Sara vowed to dismantle the apparatus of corruption that has engulfed the entire bureaucracy, put in place by the political charlatans whose insatiable greed for money and lust for power have left our country in a quagmire.
She committed to continue to serve and protect the Filipino people with dedication and devotion that the current president miserably failed to do even as the anti-Duterte forces composed of the yellows, the leftists, the religious, and the powers-that-be have formed an unholy alliance to annihilate her after they succeeded in eliminating her father, former president Rodrigo Duterte, from their inglorious path.
Impeachment, rehash of non-actionable grounds
The impeachment complaint is based on the grounds of betrayal of public trust, plunder/or malversation, bribery, graft and corruption, and other high crimes — which is a rehash of last year’s impeachment of VP Sara.
She is charged with irregular disbursement of P120 million in confidential funds of the Department of Education, which she headed until her resignation, despite the fact that the Commission on Audit has already issued an unmodified or unqualified opinion on the matter, which means there was no wrongdoing or irregularity in the disbursement of the funds.
It is claimed that the names of recipients of the confidential funds are fictitious. Of course, the names have to be fictitious! Confidential funds are used against the enemies of the state. The state has to get information on how the communist rebels, the terrorists, criminal and illegal drug syndicates and the government destabilizer go about pursuing their nefarious plans and ways. The kind of information can only be resourced from the members of those organizations that will rat on them and betray them. Necessarily, identifying them as recipients on paper will put their lives as well as their families in mortal peril; hence, their names should remain anonymous. That’s how intelligence operations are handled in maintaining and preserving the security of the state.
She is likewise accused of malversation of P500 million in confidential funds of the Office of the Vice President, based on unproved allegations and speculations.
She is charged with sedition owing to her utterances of imagining killing President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
Imagining the worst of crimes to be committed against a person is not a crime nor an impeachable ground.
She is also charged with grave threats against President Marcos, first lady Liza Araneta-Marcos and former House speaker Martin Romualdez because she allegedly contracted an assassin to kill the three after she is killed by them.
There is no such animal as threat from the grave. How can a dead person threaten somebody?
In the first place, she did not contract an assassin. There is no proof that she entered into a contract of assassination. The assassin is not even identified. What she expressed was her fear of certain death from the three. She has been saying that there is a continuing threat to her life from the time a president’s kin started eyeing the presidency and her endangerment escalated when she broke ties with the administration. She was telling the public that in the event that she is murdered, the persons she mentioned could be responsible for her death, and that her murder should be avenged. Such narration cannot be an impeachable ground.
She is falsely charged with enriching herself in that her assets increased by more than 20 million in 10 years, ignoring the fact that her husband has a lucrative law practice and may have invested in profitable ventures.
Other nonsensical narratives have been added to the impeachment complaint that only buttresses its groundlessness, as well as cements the conclusion that it is patently politically motivated.
Unsurprising, expected
It is unsurprising and expected that the House Committee on Justice, in a vote of 54 in favor, one against and without abstention, found the impeachment complaints sufficient in substance, given that its overwhelming members are allies of the administration, and would understandably and logically follow the beat of the political drum.
The manna from the holders of power is too precious to resist, even as the fear of retaliation is too strong to ignore. What is unexpectedly vexing is that there is only one solitary voice who stood his ground to register his opposition to the baseless impeachment complaint, earning him a rebuke and bashing for a correct but misunderstood analogy to show the absurdity of the ground cited.
What happened to the representatives who are Duterte supporters and, at one time or another, lambasted the impeachment of VP Sara? Why the graveyard silence, and why have they yielded to political hypocrisy and convenience? Even a committee member who initially showed his bravado in opposing the impeachment caved in by voting in favor of it, to the utter disgust and condemnation of his constituents and the rest of the discerning citizenry.
Perhaps these closeted Duterte allies are waiting for another year before they reveal their true colors, while the perennial political butterflies are waiting for the right time before they somersault to the side of Inday Sara.
1/3 vote, transmission to Senate foregone conclusion
There is absolutely no doubt that the House will get the required 1/3 votes from its members for the transmission of the impeachment complaint to the Senate for trial for obvious political considerations, as articulated earlier.
What is interesting to see is how the number of votes garnered last year in impeaching Inday Sara will decrease or be whittled down.
Watch how these politicians will play their cards in accordance with their future political plans. As always, their personal interest will be the utmost consideration in voting for or against the impeachment.
Let’s see how the cookie crumbles.
