By Benjamin Cuaresma
MANILA — Former senator Antonio Trillanes IV has raised questions over the sudden turn of events that kept him from testifying in Vice President Sara Duterte’s impeachment trial, pointing to the non-issuance of his subpoena and the role of Senate President Pro Tempore Francis “Chiz” Escudero in determining when he could appear before the impeachment court.
At his Oct. 2 press conference, Trillanes made clear that he had been prepared to testify and had gone to the Senate expecting that the prosecution would eventually call him to the witness stand.
Instead, his expected appearance never happened.
Trillanes said the prosecution had requested subpoenas for several witnesses, with his name initially included in the request. But when the subpoenas came back, he said, his was the only name missing.
That development prompted him to question why the subpoena requested for him was not issued and whether the impeachment court, through its presiding officer, had the authority to determine which prosecution witness should be allowed to testify at that point in the proceedings.
Trillanes repeatedly criticized Escudero during the press conference but stopped short of directly accusing the senator of ordering his removal from the witness list.
Instead, he questioned the circumstances surrounding the sudden change.
His concern centered on the fact that he had been prepared to testify, had appeared at the Senate and had been identified as a prosecution witness, only to be left without the subpoena that would have formally compelled his appearance.
The development came after Escudero had deferred the issuance of Trillanes’ subpoena, with the impeachment court maintaining that the prosecution should first present the relevant bank records and Anti-Money Laundering Council evidence before calling him.
The court said Trillanes’ testimony was connected to those records and that the evidence should be presented in the proper sequence.
But Trillanes challenged that reasoning.
He argued that the prosecution, not the court, should determine how it presents its witnesses and evidence. He also questioned whether the presiding officer could effectively tell the prosecution that a particular witness should not yet be called.
That became the central issue in his press conference: why was a witness who was already expected to testify suddenly left without a subpoena?
The prosecution subsequently announced that it would no longer present Trillanes.
Lead prosecutor Gerville Luistro later said Trillanes himself had asked to be withdrawn from the witness lineup. Trillanes confirmed this, explaining that he wanted to relieve the prosecution panel of pressure.
But his confirmation did not erase his questions about what happened before that withdrawal.
The impeachment court, meanwhile, denied that Trillanes had been deliberately prevented from testifying.
Court spokesperson Reginald Tongol said there was no attempt to block the former senator and maintained that the prosecution could have requested the subpoena earlier if it wanted him to testify immediately. The court also said Trillanes could have been presented voluntarily without a subpoena.
The conflicting accounts have therefore produced two distinct versions of the same episode.
From the prosecution’s perspective, Trillanes ultimately withdrew at his own request as the panel adjusted its presentation strategy.
From Trillanes’ perspective, however, the unanswered issue is why the subpoena bearing his name was not issued in the first place despite his readiness to testify.
And in the middle of that dispute is Escudero, who as presiding officer had authority over the proceedings and whose decision to defer the subpoena became one of the issues Trillanes openly questioned.
There is no established evidence that Escudero personally ordered Trillanes removed as a witness. Escudero and the impeachment court have denied that the former senator was being blocked.
But Trillanes’ press conference put the question squarely into the public record: What caused the sudden change from an expected witness who was ready to testify to a former witness whose subpoena was never issued and whose appearance was ultimately abandoned?
That question remains at the heart of the controversy as the impeachment trial moves forward without the testimony Trillanes had been preparing to deliver.
ia/xf
