Stacked Deck Guillotine: Sara Duterte’s “Probable Cause” Farce Exposed

Selective Sword of Justice: Blind for Marcos, Razor-Sharp for Sara

By Louis ‘Barok‘ C. Biraogo — May 1, 2026

Probable Farce Exposed: Constitutional Fig Leaf for a Show Trial

MGA ka-kweba, fellow citizens, pull up a chair and dim the lights. On April 30, 2026, the House Committee on Justice delivered its verdict with the solemnity of a firing squad: 53-0, “probable cause” exists to impeach Vice President Sara Duterte. No dissent. No drama. Just the mechanical click of a loaded chamber. We are not watching justice at work. We are witnessing the dress rehearsal for a slow-motion political assassination, scripted in Malacañang and choreographed in the committee room.

This is not a finding of fact. This is a finding of convenience. And your acerbic legal caveman, Barok, is here to autopsy the corpse before the Senate even gets a whiff of it.

Let us be brutally clear, as the 1987 Constitution of the Republic of the Philippines demands.

Article XI, Section 2 lists the exclusive grounds for impeachment: culpable violation of the Constitution, treason, bribery, graft and corruption, other high crimes, or betrayal of public trust.

Section 3 outlines the procedural roadmap: a verified complaint, referral to the House Committee on Justice, committee hearings and report, approval by at least one-third of all House members, transmission of the Articles of Impeachment to the Senate, and finally, conviction by a two-thirds vote of the Senators.

But here’s the sleight of hand the committee hopes you won’t notice: “probable cause” in impeachment is not the same “probable cause” your neighborhood fiscal needs before issuing a warrant. It is a political threshold, deliberately low, precisely because impeachment is the people’s nuclear option, not a criminal prosecution. The committee doesn’t have to prove guilt. It only has to say, “There’s enough smoke to justify a Senate bonfire.”

Yet what did these 53 solons do? They spent three weeks staging “clarificatory hearings” that smelled less like preliminary inquiry and more like a full-blown trial—witnesses, bank records, National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) testimony, Commission on Audit (COA) disallowances, bagman affidavits, the whole carnival. Vice President Duterte’s lawyers nailed it: the panel “expanded into matters that properly belong to a full trial.” This wasn’t sober assessment. This was opposition research with gavels.

Contrast this with the rigorous due process we demand in a courtroom—confrontation of witnesses, exclusion of hearsay, chain of custody for evidence. Here? A leaked bank transaction here, a dramatic “one-two punch” there, and suddenly we have “fire.” Manila Rep. Bienvenido Abante Jr. actually said it out loud: “We already have enough smoke to prove there’s fire.” Barok’s translation: We already decided the verdict; now we’re just lighting the match.

**“JUSTICE IS BLIND — BUT SHE PEEKS WHEN MALACAÑANG WINKS”**
***Unanimous. Inevitable. Pre-loaded.***

Arguments Gutted: Hypocrisy on Full Display

The committee’s case? “COA findings,” “bagman” affidavits, “billions in suspicious transactions,” and that 2024 press-conference soundbite about a “contract” to kill the Marcoses and Romualdez if she herself is assassinated. They call the last one the “gravest” ground—propensity for violence, betrayal of public trust, the horror of another Duterte.

Fine. Let’s dissect.

The Commission on Audit (COA) disallowance of P448 million out of the P612 million confidential funds? Serious red flag under Presidential Decree No. 1445 (PD 1445) and Republic Act No. 3019 (RA 3019), no question. But a Notice of Disallowance is an administrative finding, not a criminal conviction. It demands liquidation, not impeachment. The “unexplained wealth”? Bank records that “did not match” her SALN. Under Republic Act No. 1405 (Bank Secrecy Law) and Republic Act No. 10173 (Data Privacy Act), those records had better have arrived with pristine provenance, or we’re looking at fruit of the poisonous tree before any Senate trial even starts.

The assassination rhetoric? Reckless, yes. Hyperbolic political theater from a Duterte? Also yes. The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) calls it inciting to sedition under the Revised Penal Code (Act No. 3815) (RPC Art. 142) and grave threats (Art. 282). But context matters: a conditional, hypothetical statement made in the heat of a collapsing alliance. The committee treated it like a signed murder contract. That’s not law. That’s narrative.

Now the defense’s counter-punch: “fishing expedition,” “politically motivated,” “recycled” from last year’s failed impeachment that the Supreme Court voided on technicalities. They’re half-right. The proceedings did wander far beyond the verified complaints. But the Duterte camp’s own history—railing against “dilawan” due process when it suited them—robs their outrage of moral force. Both sides are playing the same game; only the jerseys changed.

Selective Justice Sword: Palace Loyalty, Not Blindness

Here is the central, throbbing artery of this farce, the one the committee hopes you ignore while they wave the bloody shirt of “accountability.”

Remember the impeachment complaints against President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.? Buried. Quietly. No three-week hearings. No unanimous gasps. No COA deep-dive into his family’s alleged unexplained wealth. Same House. Same Constitution. Different political math. The message is unmistakable: justice in this committee is not blind. It is merely loyal. It sees what Malacañang wants it to see.

This is weaponized procedure, plain and simple. The lightning-speed advancement of Sara Duterte’s complaints—three weeks from referral to probable cause—while earlier complaints against the sitting President gathered dust, proves the point. Article XI is supposed to be a check on power. Instead, the House majority has turned it into a pre-emptive strike on the 2028 frontrunner.

Shadow Play Unmasked: 2028 Is the Real Client

Let us stop pretending. The noble veneer of “protecting public funds” is theater. The real client is the 2028 presidential derby. Neutralize the strongest rival, fracture the Duterte bloc, force defections, and clear the path for a Marcos-friendly successor. The Duterte camp, meanwhile, is busy forging a persecution narrative to galvanize Mindanao and the die-hards. Both camps are Machiavellian. Both are right about the other’s cynicism. And we, the people, are the collateral damage.

Legal Specimens Dissected: Smoke, Mirrors, Hearsay

Confidential funds: Strongest on paper, weakest in court. COA red flags are real, but without documented intent to enrich oneself, it’s sloppy bookkeeping, not graft.
Unexplained wealth: Hearsay-heavy. Leaked records? RA 1405 violations anyone?
Assassination plot / sedition: Rhetorical dynamite, evidentiary wet firecracker.
Destabilization: The political equivalent of a conspiracy theory with better production values.

Each charge will survive the House’s one-third vote. None will survive a Senate two-thirds conviction without ironclad proof. Which means the real game is political theater, not constitutional accountability.

Succession Verdict: Constitutional Paradox Powered by Votes

This decision is constitutionally defensible—the low threshold of probable cause allows it—and simultaneously a travesty of justice. It is the paradox Francisco v. House of Representatives warned us about: a legal process powered by political votes. The Supreme Court may yet intervene on due process or one-year bar grounds (the 2025 filing still stings), but courts traditionally defer to the political branches unless the Constitution is blatantly raped.

Polemical Sermon: Halt the Theatre of the Absurd

Fellow citizens, we have had enough.

To the Marcos-Romualdez bloc: Stop treating impeachment like a pre-election chainsaw.
To the Duterte camp: Stop crying “persecution” while ignoring your own record of selective outrage.
To the fence-sitters and the public: Demand that every political actor—Marcos, Duterte, and the rest—uphold Republic Act No. 6713 (The Code of Conduct and Ethical Standards for Public Officials and Employees)’s standards of transparency and accountability, not just when it hurts the other guy.

Halt this farce. Let the Senate do its job with actual evidence, not soundbites. Fortify our democratic institutions before they collapse under the weight of 2028 ambition. Genuine public service, not blood sport—that is the only path forward.

The House has spoken. The Senate awaits. The Supreme Court hovers. And Barok, as always, will be watching with a scalpel in one hand and the Constitution in the other.

Because in the end, the only “fire” here is the one they’re trying to start in 2028. The smoke? That’s just the stench of politics as usual.