The two courts of Sara’s impeachment trial

The first week of the Senate impeachment trial of twice-impeached Vice President Sara Duterte was, indeed, a “bloodbath.” But it was the Vice President’s defense panel, not the House prosecution, that looked thoroughly drenched after being subjected to a relentless legal barrage. Their repeated attempts to derail, or at the very least blunt, the prosecution’s momentum largely failed.

Members of the House prosecution team seized the spotlight. Batangas Rep. Gerville Luistro and Akbayan Rep. Chel Diokno quickly established themselves, delivering well-reasoned arguments with confidence and composure. Equally impressive was Atty. Amando Ligutan, who argued that the Vice President had betrayed the public trust when she publicly threatened the lives of President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., First Lady Liza Araneta-Marcos and former House Speaker Martin Romualdez.

For the defense, all eyes were on the young lawyer, Carlo Joaquin Narvasa. His surname carries enormous weight in the Philippine legal profession, naturally raising expectations that he would live up to a towering legacy. It looked like a David-vs-Goliath legal showdown, a calculated move by the defense to field a young lawyer bearing one of the country’s most respected legal names. It was the classic image of someone punching above his weight, an underdog story waiting to be told. Well, it never happened.

As the first three days unfolded, the proceedings increasingly resembled a Jedi master schooling a young opponent on how the Force is actually wielded.

Narvasa came out swinging. He aggressively sought to prevent, or at the very least limit, the testimony of Ligutan’s witness, an agent of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI). He also tried to destroy the witness’s credibility and block the presentation of the now-infamous video in which Sara was seen having a meltdown, threatening to have the President and several others assassinated.

To be fair, Narvasa tried his best. He unleashed a torrent of “objections” as though his very life depended on them. Ligutan, by contrast, never seemed rattled. In his calm, measured baritone, he methodically parried every challenge, occasionally giving the young lawyer an impromptu lecture on the finer points of litigation. Time and again, he was joined by the presiding officer, who denied and overruled the defense’s objections.

The defense’s combative, overly defensive and at times plainly unreasonable interventions, along with antics such as arguing with the witness, did Sara no favors. If anything, they reinforced the public perception that she would exhaust every legal maneuver available to deflect, delay, derail and ultimately evade accountability.

Narvasa’s polished courtroom English didn’t help him either. He should have spoken in Filipino or Taglish. In a trial watched by millions of Filipinos, he seemed to forget that his audience was not limited to the impeachment court members. The court of public opinion is an arena that must be won, too.

Against Ligutan’s use of English, Filipino and Cebuano, Narvasa struggled to connect. Ligutan’s ability to shift naturally between the said languages not only showcased his command of the law but also made him instantly relatable to many viewers.

Akbayan Rep. Chel Diokno also delivered for the prosecution. Responding to the defense’s argument that evidence predating Duterte’s assumption of office was inadmissible under a Supreme Court resolution, Diokno calmly pointed out that nowhere in the cited resolution was such a prohibition stated. He also called out defense counsel, Atty. Shiela Sison, who violated a basic rule of courtroom decorum after she twice addressed the prosecution directly instead of coursing them through the presiding officer. It was a subtle correction, but one that cut deep.

Not to be outdone, the Cayetano siblings, God’s gifts to the legal profession, repeatedly and condescendingly lectured their fellow senator-judges on how to conduct themselves, even name-dropping their law schools as though it gives their arguments extra weight. With every sermon, they looked less like senator-judges and more like members of Sara Duterte’s defense panel. Their so-called devotion to impartiality and respect for rules only reminded the public of their hypocrisy: Pia, for escorting the 18 maleta boys to the infamous “Blue Ribbon committee” hearing that many dismissed as “fake,” and Alan Peter, for harboring an international fugitive accused of mass murder.

Alan Peter attempted to rescue the defense’s narrative that Sara’s assassination threat had context, was merely conditional, harmed no one and therefore was not a crime. He threw questions to the witness, hoping to fish for an answer that would support that theory. Instead, without batting an eyelash, the witness said that “the threat is absolute.” Just like that, the Senate Pokémon’s fishing expedition collapsed.

Clearly, the House prosecution took the opening week of the trial. It dictated the pace, controlled the narrative and landed the more telling blows. Yet, we are still in the early part of the trial. More witnesses will take the stand, more evidence will be presented and the defense will have every opportunity to regroup.

If the first week established anything, however, it is that an impeachment trial is won not only through legal arguments but through effective political communication. A party may gain the upper hand inside the Senate chamber yet lose the battle for the people’s hearts and minds.

Lest we forget, during the impeachment trial of former president Joseph Estrada, the unopened second envelope may have been a procedural victory for the defense, but it ignited EDSA Dos.

The same lesson applies today. Sara’s impeachment trial is unfolding in two courtrooms simultaneously – the Senate and the court of public opinion. Winning both is the ideal, as legal victories need public legitimacy. But neither side can afford to lose in the court of public opinion. The people, rightly or wrongly, have a way of reshaping political realities, even altering the fate of those who believe they have already won.