Philippine VP Sara Duterte impeachment case moves forward

A Philippine congressional committee agreed overwhelmingly on Wednesday to advance the impeachment case against Vice President Sara Duterte, setting the stage for a potential vote that could decide her political future.

The daughter of former president Rodrigo Duterte, who in February announced a 2028 presidential bid, was impeached last year, only for the Supreme Court to toss the case out over procedural issues.

Under the Philippine constitution, an impeachment by the House of Representatives triggers a Senate trial, where a guilty verdict would ban Duterte from elected office for life.

The new complaints, ruled “sufficient in substance” by a vote of 54-1 on Wednesday, accuse her of graft and corruption while in office and of making a death threat against former ally President Ferdinand Marcos.

She will now have 10 days to respond before the start of a hearing of probable cause necessary to move the complaints to a House vote.

Duterte’s 2025 impeachment effectively bypassed the committee process, when the necessary one-third of House members signed an impeachment complaint, sending it directly to the Senate.

ALSO READ: Ex-Philippines president Duterte drew up ‘death lists’, boasted about murders: ICC prosecutor

“Our vote today is not a verdict of guilt nor an act of condemnation. It’s simply a decision on whether the constitutional process should move forward,” Representative Ferdinand Hernandez said minutes before the vote.

The vice president’s legal team said Wednesday they would not comment on specific allegations.

“For now, we will refrain from discussing the substance of the case in the media and will instead address these matters through the proper constitutional processes,” lawyer Michael Poa said in a statement.

The 54-1 gap

While a probable cause hearing still looms, Michael Tiu, assistant professor of law at the University of the Philippines, told AFP he believed nothing would derail the path to a House vote.

“With the 54-1 gap in the committee voting, I think it’s impossible that these impeachment complaints will be junked, given that there’s a huge gap and many saw that the complaints have merit,” he said.

Analysts have warned that Duterte’s presidential announcement will weigh heavily on lawmakers forced to gauge the repercussions of a vote against someone who may yet hold the country’s highest office.

ALSO READ: Philippines digs out from Typhoon Fung-wong as death toll climbs

The alleged death threat against Marcos stems from a late-night press briefing in which Duterte claimed to have hired an assassin to kill the president and members of his family should he have her cut down first.

While the vice president later said the comments were misinterpreted, lawmaker Gerville Luistro said Wednesday that the alleged threats could destabilise institutions.

“They carry weight. They create fear,” she said.

Duterte and Marcos have been engaged in a high-stakes political brawl that erupted within weeks of their 2022 win in the presidential election, when the vice president was denied her favoured cabinet portfolios and instead named education secretary.

The justice committee last month tossed out a pair of impeachment complaints against Marcos, ruling that allegations of corruption over a scandal involving bogus flood control projects lacked substance.