Alvarez softens stance on impeach cases vs Leni

House Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez is treading carefully on whether to endorse either of the two impeachment complaints against Vice President Leni Robredo.

In what appeared to be a softening in his stance, Alvarez told reporters on Tuesday that he was still reviewing the impeachment complaints submitted to him by two groups seeking his endorsement.

“I don’t want to just keep attacking even when there’s no substance. So we are studying it. I’m not saying I will truly file. If there’s substance, why not? Like I said before, if there is substance, and if it can stand in an impeachment trial, then it can be considered,” he said.

This was markedly different from the tougher tone he took in March when he expressed openness to the idea of impeaching Robredo for “betraying the public trust” after she delivered a recorded speech to a UN side meeting criticizing the Duterte government’s bloody war on drugs.

Alvarez said he referred the impeachment complaints to the House justice committee “to evaluate whether it’s OK to endorse it.”

“It would be hard it if it were just me,” he said.

The first complaint against Robredo was filed by Marcos loyalists Oliver Lozano and Melchor Chavez, questioning her judgment in sending her video message to a side event of the annual meeting of the UN Convention on Narcotic Drugs in Vienna in March.

Another group of lawyers filed a second complaint earlier this month but, as in the case of Lozano and Chavez, was unable to secure a House member’s endorsement, forcing the group to submit its complaint to Alvarez’s office for consideration.

Under the 1987 Constitution, any impeachment complaint may be filed by a citizen if it is endorsed by a member of the House.

Alvarez said he was also studying another impeachment complaint filed by the Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption against Ombudsman Conchita Carpio Morales.

“It’s true, they are asking me to endorse it, but I have to study it first,” he said.

The Speaker said it would be impossible for the House to deal with three impeachment complaints at the same time.