BAYAN Panay backs impeachment vs. Sara Duterte

By Juliane Judilla

Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (BAYAN) Panay on Friday expressed strong support for the impeachment complaint filed Feb. 2 against Vice President Sara Duterte by progressive and sectoral leaders, a move endorsed by three incumbent Makabayan bloc representatives in the House of Representatives.

In a statement, BAYAN Panay said long-standing grounds for Duterte’s impeachment remain valid, particularly the alleged abuse of PHP 612.5 million in confidential funds allocated to the Office of the Vice President and the Department of Education.

“Past grounds for her impeachment remain valid, especially the abuse of PHP 612.5 million in confidential funds of the Office of the Vice President and the Department of Education,” the group said.

They cited findings of the Commission on Audit, which issued a notice of disallowance for unexplained portions of Duterte’s confidential fund expenditures and ordered her office to return the amounts.

“Despite her brattiness and repeated attempts to evade public scrutiny, the Commission on Audit issued a notice of disallowance for unexplained portions of her confidential funds and ordered her office to return such amounts,” the group said, adding that this “indicat[es] that she committed illegal acts and must be held accountable.”

The group emphasized the scale of the alleged misuse and warned against allowing the vice president to evade accountability.

“Hundreds of millions of pesos are not a small amount of money. She must not be let off the hook once again through the abuse of legal technicalities or political considerations,” BAYAN Panay said.

The group called for Duterte’s impeachment and conviction over the confidential fund issue while reiterating its demand for the impeachment and removal of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. over separate allegations.

“To exact accountability from public officials handling the people’s money, Sara Duterte must be impeached and convicted over the confidential fund issue — just as Marcos Jr. must be impeached and removed from office,” the statement read, citing allegations involving unprogrammed appropriations, Philippine Health Insurance Corp. funds, and large confidential and intelligence fund allocations for the Office of the President.

BAYAN Panay also pointed to additional grounds for Duterte’s removal that surfaced over the past year, including a report by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism on campaign donations during the 2022 elections.

The group said Duterte and her UniTeam running mate Marcos Jr. “accepted nearly PHP 20 million each in campaign donations from government contractors that already had ongoing public works projects before or during the election period,” stressing that “making use of such donations is prohibited by the Omnibus Election Code.”

BAYAN Panay said Filipinos have grown weary of entrenched political dynasties, accusing Duterte and Marcos Jr. of treating public office as an inherited possession rather than a public trust.

The group urged the House of Representatives to act without delay on the impeachment complaint against Duterte and warned against applying double standards.

It added that if the House proceeds against Duterte but blocks impeachment complaints against Marcos Jr., “it will only further expose the country’s institutions as protectors of orchestrated corruption.”

According to BAYAN Panay, accountability can only be achieved through the removal of both leaders from office.

“By removing both the king and queen of corruption from their positions of power, only then can the country proceed with fair investigations and swift accountability mechanisms for the countless corruption issues that have rocked the nation,” the group said.