SolGen to SC: Let House proceed with impeach-Ombudsman hearings

Reminding the Supreme Court that Congress is a co-equal branch, the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) asked the high court on Thursday to lift its order suspending the impeachment proceedings of the Lower House against Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez. In his 70-page comment, Solicitor General Jose Anselmo Cadiz sought the lifting of the SC’s status quo ante order, which stemmed from Gutierrez’s petition to stop the Lower House’s committee on justice from hearing impeachment complaints filed against her. Cadiz said the SC must not intervene with the proceedings of the House as a coordinate and co-equal branch of government based on the constitutional principle of separation of powers. He added that Gutierrez’s proper recourse is not with the SC, but with the House itself, through its respondent committee. According to the Solicitor General, the justice committee’s evaluation that the impeachment complaints are sufficient in form and substance is just a preliminary step in the impeachment process, to which Gutierrez can respond by submitting her reply. “The existence of this remedy precludes her from seeking from this Honorable Court the writs of certiorari and prohibition which lie only where there is no plain, speedy, and adequate remedy in the ordinary course of law," Cadiz said in his comment. The SC issued the order on September 14 — a day after Gutierrez filed her petition claiming that the House panel hearing violated the Constitution, which does not allow two impeachment proceedings against an official within one year. (See: SC suspends impeachment proceedings vs Ombudsman) Two separate impeachment complaints were filed against Gutierrez: one by Bagong Alyansang Makabayan and another by former Akbayan Rep. Risa Hontiveros-Baraquel. Cadiz mentioned an SC decision issued in November 2003, which ruled that a second impeachment complaint against then Chief Justice Hilario Davide Jr. was against the constitution because it was filed in the same year as an earlier impeachment complaint against Davide. The “Francisco ruling" — so-called because the SC issued it in favor of lawyer Ernesto Francisco’s petition against the second impeach-Davide complaint — stated that filing an impeachment complaint bars the filing of other impeachment complaints against the same person within one year. “The ruling in Francisco, that the filing and referral of an impeachment complaint constitute the ‘initiation of impeachment proceedings’ so as to bar the initiation of another impeachment proceeding, makes it easy for erring officials to evade impeachment and calls for reexamination of such ruling," Cadiz stated. He added that the Constitution and the rules on impeachment proceedings do not require that an impeachment complaint include only one offense, saying that the inclusion of betrayal of public trust allows the filing of several charges as grounds for impeachment. Further, Cadiz said framers of the Constitution believed the impeachment process is a “political exercise" to ensure that public trust is upheld. “The wisdom of designing impeachment as a political exercise prevailed among the framers of the Constitution, some of whom pointed out that although the impeachment of public officials may not result in their removal from office, the political exercise nonetheless has a deterrent effect as a means of ensuring that the public trust is upheld," he said.—Jerrie M. Abella/JV, GMANews.TV