THE Senate impeachment court has sufficient authority to open the sealed Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) box containing tax records linked to Vice President Sara Z. Duterte, her husband Atty. Manases Carpio and their businesses because impeachment is a separate constitutional proceeding.
“Kumbaga it doesn’t need ‘yung pong sinasabing exceptions doon po sa code ng BIR para mabuksan po itong box po na ito sapat-sapat na ‘yun pong kapangyarihan ng Senate impeachment court para buksan po ito pong BIR box,” Bicol Saro Party-list Rep. Terry Ridon said.
Ridon, a member of the House prosecution team, explained that the dispute over the sealed BIR box began during the earlier House Justice Committee proceedings, where the tax agency raised concerns over the handling of tax records.
“Noon pong nakaraang House Justice proceedings po kasi, meron pong concern ‘yung BIR eh,” Ridon noted.
He said the BIR position was anchored on the treatment of tax records in legislative inquiries, but several members of the House panel took the view that impeachment is a distinct constitutional process.
“Ang sinasabi ho nila kailangan daw po, this is through a legislative inquiry and secondly kailangan po in an executive session,” Ridon recounted.
“Ang posisyon ng ilan sa mga myembro ng komite, this is not a legislative inquiry this is entirely separate work of Congress which is impeachment proceedings,” he added.
Ridon maintained that the subpoena issued to the BIR required the agency to produce the documents sought by the House in the impeachment proceedings.
“Pero ang posisyon ho ng iba, the subpoena is on the BIR to actually produce the document,” Ridon pointed out.
He argued that if the BIR provision invoked during the House proceedings did not apply to impeachment, the same logic should apply before the Senate impeachment court.
“So ibig sabihin that particular provision does not actually apply to the impeachment proceedings at the House and logically when we reach the Senate it also does not apply to the Senate impeachment court which is why talagang panawagan ho namin buksan ito,” Ridon stressed.
Ridon said there is nothing unusual in marking the sealed box itself as object evidence during the pretrial proceedings.
“Wala hong unusual dun kasi object evidence naman ho yun, so wala hong problema to mark the thing itself,” he said.
He also expressed confidence that the sealed box contains the tax records covered by the BIR subpoena.
“I don’t think we have any doubt that what is contained within the box is actually BIR documents of tax documents of the Duterte-Carpio couple and their businesses. The exact documents that we had subpoenad from the BIR,” Ridon said.
