House leaders: Justice panel has authority to open, examine VP Sara’s bank records

The House Committee on Justice has the authority to subpoena and subsequently examine the bank records of Vice President Sara Duterte, House leaders said Wednesday.

House justice panel chairperson Gerville Luistro of Batangas and House Senior Deputy Minority Leader Leila de Lima of ML party-list said examining Duterte's bank records is now in order after the House justice panel found the impeachment complaints against the Vice President sufficient in substance.

“You will remember that one of the exceptions to the Bank Secrecy Law is [an] impeachment proceeding. This [impeachment proceeding] is an exception to the Bank Secrecy Law, which means we can look in to the records of the bank account [of the Vice President],” Luistro said when asked if issuing a subpoena on the bank records of the Vice President would violate any existing law.

Section 2 of the Bank Secrecy Act states that all bank deposits are confidential, except in some cases including impeachment. 

“There are complainants, and if they will be filing a motion for the issuance of the subpoena duces tecum, that is with regards to the relevant documents, and even [subpoena] ad testificandum [for] the attendance of significant witnesses, we will be acting on their motion,” Luistro added.

De Lima, a former Justice chief, agreed with Luistro.

“Yes, dapat. Because the allegations [against her] include accumulation of unexplained wealth that is grossly disproportionate to the entries in her SALNs,” de Lima told reporters in a separate interview, referring to the Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth.

“That is why the House justice committee should issue a subpoena on the SALNs of the Vice President, dating back to her days as mayor and vice mayor of Davao City. The same goes for her bank record. The committee would be well within its powers to direct the submission of bank records [of the Vice President] in an impeachment proceeding,” she added.

Ahead of the House justice panel vote on the sufficiency in substance of the impeachment complaints against the Vice President, Bicol Saro party-list Representative Terry Ridon presented copies of the Vice President’s SALNs since 2008.

Based on these SALNs, the Vice President posted a net worth of P18 million in 2008, an amount that now stands at P88 million as of end of December 2024.

“I will present for the record the most recent SALN that had been released by the Ombudsman, Madam Chair. What should be noted is the original SALN net worth [in 2008], which was P18 million. For 2024, it is P88.5 million. We are submitting [these] for the record because these are public records,” Ridon, a lawyer, said.

“We are stating it for the record because this is the precise wording of the Corona articles of impeachment which had proceeded to the Senate and had resulted in a conviction. It is very clear that this is the process that we have to undertake and what the endorsers would want to undertake,” he added.

Ridon was referring to former Chief Justice Renato Corona, who was convicted of betrayal of public trust and culpable violation of the Constitution by the Senate impeachment court over false entries in his SALN. — BM, GMA Integrated News