Vice President Sara Duterte‘s lead defense counsel on Monday said impeachment is a powerful democratic mechanism to hold public officials accountable but should never be abused for political purposes.
In her opening statement before the Senate impeachment court, Atty. Shiela Sison cited the Supreme Court of the Philippines‘s July 25, 2025 ruling in Duterte v. House of Representatives, which declared the Articles of Impeachment transmitted to the Senate void ab initio after finding that the House committed grave abuse of discretion.
Sison said the high court later affirmed that ruling by denying the House of Representatives’ motion for reconsideration.
Quoting the Supreme Court’s decision, Sison said, “While impeachment is a powerful democratic process to call out corruption and grave abuse, impeachment can be abused, and impeachment should never be abused.”
“Justice includes accountability. Justice includes fairness. Without fairness, there is abuse,” she told the impeachment court.
Sison argued that impeachment is not merely a political process but also a constitutional and legal proceeding that must strictly comply with the Constitution, existing laws and procedural rules.
She maintained that while the House has the sole power to initiate impeachment proceedings, only the Senate has the authority to try and decide impeachment cases.
The defense also criticized the House Committee on Justice proceedings, saying they went beyond the scope of the impeachment complaints and became what it described as a “fishing expedition” for evidence not included in the charges against Duterte.
According to Sison, the House proceedings created a narrative against the vice president even before the impeachment trial formally began in the Senate.
