A Joint Statement from the Deans of the Five Ateneo Schools and Colleges of Law on the Immediate Commencement of the Impeachment Trial of Vice President Sara Zimmerman Duterte-Carpio

8 June 2025

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We, the undersigned Deans of the schools and colleges of law of Ateneo de Manila University, Xavier University—Ateneo de Cagayan, Ateneo de Davao University, Ateneo de Zamboanga University and Ateneo de Naga University collectively call for the immediate commencement of the impeachment trial against Vice President Sara Zimmerman Duterte-Carpio and its continuation into the 20th Congress, if necessary.

We confirm that as Jesuit, Filipino, and Catholic legal educational institutions, we are deeply committed in our teaching and formation missions to truth, justice, and the rule of law.

Thus:

1. As educators, we are called upon by our Ignatian foundation to educate men and women to embrace and build social, economic, and political structures that will preserve our common humanity and our collective interest as Filipinos so as to foster the promotion of justice in the spirit of service and the pursuit of the greatest universal good.  Thus, not only do we teach law and preach justice, we also teach with equal measure its faithful application.

2. As Filipino citizens in a democratic and republican form of government, where sovereignty resides in the people from whom all government authority emanates, it is a fundamental recognition that the powers and functions exercised by all government agencies and public officials are merely reposed in them by the people for the time being, in the interest of good governance and the common good, with duties and conditions imposed by the Constitution.  Thus, we adhere to the time-honored principle that public office is a public trust that must be faithfully respected and protected in the name of the sovereign Filipino people. After all, “the Framers put primacy on the integrity of the public service by declaring it as a constitutional principle and a State policy. More significantly, the 1987 Constitution strengthened and solidified what has been first proclaimed in the 1973 Constitution by commanding public officers to be accountable to the people at all times.” [1] Thus, accountability of public officials for their acts and omissions cannot and should not be overridden by a resort to obfuscating technicalities and political and/or self-serving maneuverings.

3. As advocates of the rule of law, we submit to the supremacy of the Constitution as the fundamental law of the land.  As such, faithful obedience to the constitutional mandates is requisite and mandatory; hence, not discretionary and optional.  It is what we have all subscribed to when we ratified the Constitution.  It is what we are being called to observe and obey now.

It is based on these foregoing principles and spirit that we expressly urge the Senate of the Philippines to immediately commence the impeachment trial of Vice President Duterte-Carpio and for a fair, impartial, and speedy disposition of the case, which not only upholds public office accountability, but one that also respects due process, as enshrined and mandated in our Constitution.  

Our Constitution is clear and categorical:  Once the Articles of Impeachment have been filed and transmitted by at least one-thirds of all the members of the House of Representatives, “trial by the Senate shall forthwith proceed,” without conditions or qualifications, and without equivocation or obstruction.  Moreover, the nature of the Senate as a continuing body has been firmly settled, with the exception only of day-to-day business like legislative bills and investigations, when the Court held that: “Certainly, there is no debate that the Senate as an institution is “continuing,” as it is not dissolved as an entity with each national election or change in the composition of its members. However, in the conduct of its day-to-day business the Senate of each Congress acts separately and independently of the Senate of the Congress before it.” [2] From the afore-quoted pronouncement of the Court, it is clear that the Senate is a continuing body as an impeachment court, which is a quasi-judicial function and which in no wise can be considered as a legislative function that could expire at the end of each Congress.  Once the impeachment trial commences, and beyond political colors and affiliations, we likewise urge and call on the Philippine Senate to remain impartial and non-partisan to ensure that the constitutional guarantees of due process and equal protection of the laws of the respondent are respected and safeguarded.

We are making this urgent call in faithful response to our moral and spiritual duty as educators and formators of future Ateneo lawyers.  We pray that the Philippine Senate will likewise respond to its moral and constitutional duty as true servants of the public upon whom the public trust is reposed, one that is faithful to the truth and to the Filipino people.