Pro-Duterte senator charged with graft ahead of impeachment trial

MANILA: A Philippine senator and key ally of Sara Duterte was charged with graft on Friday, the country’s ombudsman said, days before the vice-president’s Senate impeachment trial is to begin.

The charges against Senator Rodante Marcoleta, tied to his alleged failure to declare US$1.2 million in unused election campaign funds, include “plunder”, a non-bailable offence which involves corruption of 50 million pesos (US$814,000) or more.

The decision to file charges was not “made lightly or by choice”, the ombudsman’s office said in a Friday statement.

“The evidence includes three cash donations totalling p75 million (US$1.2 million), undeclared in the senator’s (statement of assets and liabilities) and campaign finance reports,” the statement said, adding Marcoleta had “publicly confirmed receiving the money”.

It was not immediately known if a warrant for the 72-year-old’s arrest had been issued.

Thousands of members of the Iglesia Ni Cristo church, a powerful Philippine sect with ties to the Duterte political dynasty, took to the streets to protest the looming charges on Tuesday, grinding traffic to a halt in the capital.

Church spokesman Edwil Zabala slammed the case against Marcoleta as “selective justice”.

Marcoleta is the second Duterte-aligned senator to be charged in just over a month, with Jose “Jinggoy” Estrada jailed over his alleged role in a massive corruption scandal involving bogus flood control projects.

A third Duterte ally, Senator Ronald “Bato” Dela Rosa, is in hiding after narrowly escaping arrest on an International Criminal Court warrant over his role in the deadly drug war conducted by the vice-president’s father, ex-president Rodrigo Duterte.

Whether their absence will have a bearing on the outcome of the impeachment trial is a matter of debate.

While the Philippine Constitution requires a guilty vote by “two-thirds of all the members” of the 24-seat Senate to convict, impeachment prosecutor Representative Gerville “Jinky” Luistro has argued the threshold should only include senators who take part in the trial.

“If a senator is in jail, in hiding, in hospital or abroad … how are we going to consider them for the purpose of determining… the required number of votes?” she asked at a press conference last month.

The House of Representatives on May 11 impeached Duterte on allegations of graft, corruption, bribery and an alleged assassination plot against one-time ally President Ferdinand Marcos.

A guilty verdict in the Senate would see her removed as vice-president and permanently banned from elected office.