Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno need not accede to the invitation of House Committee on Justice Chairman Rep. Reynaldo Umali to appear during the hearing on the impeachment case against her on November 22, 2017.

The Chief Justice can effectively and legally appear through her counsel on record who could also cross-examine the complainant and his witnesses on her behalf.

Both the Constitution and the House Rules on Impeachment, strengthened by entrenched jurisprudence, accord a respondent in an impeachment case, which is akin to a criminal prosecution, the right to retain a counsel of her choice and the corollary right to have her counsel conduct the cross-examination.

The opinion of Umali that the Chief Justice herself must make the cross-examination is an utter derogation of the respondent’s right to counsel, who is not a useless appendage in the proceedings.

EDCEL C. LAGMAN