MANILA, Philippines — Atty. Paolo Panelo, spokesperson for Vice President Sara Duterte, stood by his calculation that the Senate effectively spent ₱500 million over 20 trial days for two impeachment articles, pushing back against Senator Panfilo “Ping” Lacson’s call to correct the figure.
Speaking on Wednesday, October 14, Panelo explained that his estimate stemmed from reported daily operating expenses, raising questions about how the institution separates regular legislative overhead from impeachment proceedings.
“If the Senate spends ₱25 million per day for legislative functions as clarified by Senator Ping Lacson, but Senate President Sherwin Gatchalian said back in July that there will be ‘no additional expenses for the impeachment trial because (they’re) treating this as an activity similar to a plenary session,’ and considering that no other sessions or hearings can be had simultaneously, then doesn’t that mean that the Senate effectively spends ₱25 million per impeachment trial day?” Panelo said in a statement.
The defense follows Lacson’s public appeal for Panelo to retract the claim that the Senate wasted ₱500 million during the trial days dedicated to Articles I and IV of the impeachment complaint, which the prosecution later dropped.
Lacson clarified that the ₱25-million daily figure pertains strictly to the institution’s regular legislative operations rather than trial expenses, noting that the specific budget for the trial mostly remained unspent through continuing appropriations.
“Where did he get his ₱25M/day figure? As far as I know, the GAA 2025 budget for the impeachment trial, most of which has remained unspent (only roughly ₱2 million was disbursed for the judges’ robes and other items) from the original ₱27.5 million is now being used under the ‘continuing appropriations’ provision in the General Appropriations Act,” Lacson stated.
“The ₱25M per day clearly refers to the legislative functions of the Senate, not to the impeachment trial as misinterpreted, and the basis was the Maintenance and Other Operating Expenses (MOOE) and Personnel Services (PS) for one year which I computed on a per-day basis when the Cayetano-led boycott resulted in zero-legislation output due to lack of quorum after his ouster as Senate President,” he added.
While Lacson categorized Panelo’s figures as an honest misinterpretation and urged a correction, Panelo maintained that his calculations were derived from desktop research and leadership statements regarding plenary session similarities.
“Anyway, my estimate was based on ‘desktop research’ which seemed perfectly acceptable to many Senator-Judges based on their seeming approval of Atty. Alexander Cabrera’s testimony. I hope for the people’s sake that my estimates, like Atty. Cabrera’s, are way off,” Panelo expressed.
Panelo concluded that the core issue extends beyond exact accounting, pointing instead to the expenditure of state resources on withdrawn charges that could no longer be resolved.
“What is important is that substantial government resources have been spent on articles of impeachment that the Senate Impeachment Court can no longer rule on, and apparently had no other purpose than to malign the Vice President, who would have no fair opportunity to refute them,” he noted.