From ABS-CBN News

By Rhianna Ramos

The House Committee on Justice said on Wednesday, February 4, that two impeachment complaints against President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. were insufficient in substance and effectively dismissed both cases after finding the allegations legally weak.

The committee acted after deliberations spanning several days, during which lawmakers weighed whether the complaints met the constitutional standard for impeachment proceedings.

While both complaints were earlier declared sufficient in form, the panel concluded that neither advanced to the more demanding substance threshold required to proceed.

The first complaint, filed by Atty. Andre de Jesus and endorsed by Pusong Pinoy Party-list Rep. Jett Nisay, accused Marcos of multiple alleged offenses, including betrayal of public trust and constitutional violations. 

However, panel members rejected these allegations as lacking sufficient factual support, and in the first panel vote on the de Jesus complaint, 42 committee members voted to dismiss it as insufficient in substance, with only one opposing vote and several abstentions.

This complaint also accused Marcos of alleged misconduct — including controversial decisions relating to the former President Rodrigo Duterte’s surrender to the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Lawmakers said the presentation lacked documented evidence showing the President’s direct involvement in impeachable wrongdoing.

Moreover, the motion to declare the second complaint sufficient in substance was also defeated, with 39 panel members voting against it and just seven in favor. 

The complaint, filed by activists and backed by Makabayan bloc lawmakers, alleged betrayal of public trust tied to the Baselined-Balanced-Managed (BBM) Parametric Formula used in budget allocations — a policy critics say enabled inequitable infrastructure funding.

House Justice Committee Chairperson Rep. Gerville “Jinky Bitrics” Luistro emphasized that the committee’s role at this stage is not to determine guilt or innocence, but to assess whether the complaints present a recitation of facts that could constitute an impeachable offense.

Lawmakers repeatedly underscored that allegations resting on second-hand accounts, unauthenticated materials, or broad policy critiques did not meet the constitutional threshold, which requires more than conjecture to advance an impeachment complaint.

Critics of the complaints have also argued that issues such as budgeting formulas and administrative decisions are better addressed through legislative oversight or the courts rather than through impeachment proceedings, which traditionally focus on serious breaches like treason, bribery, graft, or gross betrayal of public trust.

With both complaints dismissed at the committee level, they will be reported back to the House plenary, as under the 1987 Philippine Constitution, a complaint must be found sufficient in both form and substance before it can be considered for a plenary vote. 

At least one-third of all House members must approve an impeachment complaint for it to be transmitted to the Senate for a trial, a threshold now widely seen as unlikely to be met given the committee’s findings and the pro-Marcos majority in the legislature.

President Marcos has denied all allegations in both complaints, and his allies have welcomed the committee’s decision as a reinforcement of due process.

Meanwhile, opponents of the ruling argue that substantive policy and governance concerns raised in the filings still warrant broader scrutiny through other legislative or judicial avenues.

Under constitutional rules, the dismissal for lack of substance may also trigger a one-year bar on filing another impeachment complaint against the same official on the same grounds.

The panel will prepare and submit its report to the full House, where leaders may determine how and when the issue is taken up in plenary sessions.