'Impeach trial is a medieval tool'

MANILA, Philippines - For Sen. Edgardo Angara, impeachment is a “medieval tool” that the country should consider doing away with in removing a sitting government official.

In an interview last Friday after his lecture at the UP College of Law, Angara said that with the “highly passionate and highly partisan” politics in the country, impeachment proceedings have become occasions for rival lawyers to grandstand to sway public opinion to their side.

“I wish we had another mode,” Angara said.

The Senate, convened as an impeachment court, is hearing the complaint against Chief Justice Renato Corona.

“When there’s a dispute, it’s usually the judiciary that settles and resolves conflicts in society... This is a lesson on how political conflicts are resolved under our system,” Angara said.

He said that in other countries, political conflicts are resolved by other means, even by coups or assassination.

“In Mauritius, it’s resolved by ordinary process. They will file a case against you and you will go through the ordinary process,” he said.

He added that in many countries, including England where it originated, impeachment had already been “abandoned” as a means of resolving political conflicts “because it is already archaic.”