Thursday, November 20, 2008 3 impeach raps vs Arroyo junked
THE House justice committee on Wednesday rejected the three impeachment complaints filed against President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
Voting 35-4, committee head Quezon City Representative Matias Defensor dismissed the complaints filed by lawyers Manuel "Manolo" Quezon, Guillermo Sotto, and Oliver Lozano for violating the one-year constitutional ban on filing more than one impeachment complaint against the same official within the same year.
Baguio Representative Mauricio Domogan moved for the dismissal of the three impeachment cases.
Those who voted against the dismissal were Makati Representative Mar-Len Abigail Binay and party-list Representatives Teodoro Casiño and Satur Ocampo of Bayan Muna and Liza Maza of Gabriela.
A disappointed but not so-surprised Quezon said their camp considers filing a petition before the Supreme Court (SC) to find out if the House committed abuse of discretion.
Because of the panel's ruling, the complaint of businessman Joey de Venecia, son of former Speaker Jose de Venecia Jr., and civil society groups will start undergoing the test of sufficiency in substance Thursday.
The de Venecia complaint was filed before the Office of the Secretary General ahead of the Sotto and Lozano complaints, which were also filed on October 13 when the one-year ban on filing, was lifted.
However, House secretary general Marilyn Yap automatically referred to the justice panel the Quezon "intervening" complaint filed last November 12.
The Sotto complaint, endorsed by Eastern Samar Representative Teodolo Coquilla, was referred by the plenary to the same committee last Tuesday.
At the start of the hearing, Defensor declared that the complaint for intervention is "immature, and clearly a collateral accessory to the original impeachment complaint."
"Therefore the chair rules that the same be returned to the original proponent," he said, eliciting strong opposition from Parañaque Representative Roilo Golez who said that the chair has already preempted the committee's decision.
Casiño and fellow party-list Representative Rafael Mariano of Anakpawis said the committee should not be so technical as to prohibit the Quezon complaint, which they said, merely intervenes in the de Venecia complaint by including the charge of treason for attempting to enter into a memorandum of agreement on ancestral domain (MOA-AD) with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).
They insisted that the panel can consolidate the complaints.
Domogan, however, said the complaint "cannot excuse itself to be free from the one-year ban period." "We're not being technical here. We're just following the procedures provided under the Constitution," he added.
Albay Representative Edcel Lagman said: "The nomenclature of the pleading is immaterial. It could be labeled as a 'supplemental complaint,' 'amended complaint or 'complaint-in-intervention.'"
"These are all subject to the constitutionally imposed one-year bar rule after an impeachment complaint has been properly and seasonably filed and initiated. After the commencement of the one-year ban and before it lapses, all subsequent complaints of whatever nature or nomenclature are prohibited pleadings or complaints," he said.
Moreover, Lagman said the Quezon complaint "allege a new cause of action on the memorandum of agreement-ancestral domain (MOA-AD)."
"This additional common ground makes them indubitably new complaints and are thus rendered more constitutionally infirm," he said.
Maguindanao Representative Simeon Datumanong, former chairman of the justice panel, said the committee should simply base its decision upon precedence, noting that it had barred all the supplemental complaints in the past.
For his part, Iloilo Representative Raul Gonzalez Jr. said it is the opposition that should be blamed for the non-inclusion of the three impeachment complaints after its members refused to relax the rules governing the conduct of impeachment proceedings.
The committee later used up the remaining time arguing on the ground rules for Thursday's deliberation on the sufficiency in substance of the de Venecia complaint.
Datumanong said precedence dictates that both House rules and precedence are clear that the requirement for substance is not merely a recital of simple facts, which constitutes the offense charge but of "ultimate facts."
This means that the de Venecia complaint must have a clear stipulation of pertinent information on how the accused, the President, committed the offenses - the same test where all the past complaints failed. (WV/Sunnex)
