Members of the “First Impeachment Group,” otherwise called the “Peach Movement,” appealed to still-undecided senators to use their positions in the upper chamber to push through with Vice President Sara Duterte’s impeachment trial.
In an interview on Thursday, Peach Movement convenor Fr. Flavie Villanueva, SVD, lamented how Senate President Chiz Escudero seems to be skirting the issue by citing other legislative priorities as an excuse.
“What could be more important than holding the second-highest official of the land accountable for corruption and other misdeeds that she already admitted? He (Escudero) is simply refusing to face the issue,” he told Manila Standard.
Villanueva, who led the Justice and Peace Office at the Society of the Divine Word religious order, stressed that it is about time the younger Duterte be held accountable for how she spent funds allocated to her offices.
“It’s hard to separate the father from the daughter. The father who is responsible for ‘tokhang’ [extrajudicial killings] and the daughter who plundered the country’s coffers,” he added.
Villanueva disclosed that the First Impeachment Group is composed of those responsible for filing the initial impeachment complaint against Duterte at the House of Representatives, with support from some of those who filed subsequent complaints.
The group includes party-list representative-elect Leila De Lima, who was jailed by the Duterte administration on supposedly trumped-up charges.
