House prosecution team drops bribery article against Sara Duterte

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The House prosecution panel has filed a manifestation with the Senate impeachment court that it will drop Article III or the bribery charges in the trial of Vice President Sara Duterte.

In a press conference on Friday, House prosecutor Keith Flores said the prosecution had reached a decision and informed the Senate tribunal.

"I think we already filed our manifestation last Tuesday pa that we will be dropping bribery… the team already came to a decision (that) we will end with Article II," Flores said, referring to charges against Duterte relating to alleged unexplained wealth.

"It's totally at the discretion of the prosecution team po kung anong articles ang ipro-prosecute nila and in this particular case, we did all three articles except for Article III, which is bribery," he added.

(It's totally at the discretion of the prosecution team which articles they will prosecute, and in this particular case, we did all three articles except for Article III, which is bribery.)

Flores said that the dropping of the article had little to do with the strength of their case, saying the prosecution is merely conscious of the timetable that they set for themselves.

House prosecutor 1-Rider party-list Representative Rodge Gutierrez maintained that their case remained strong.

"All articles that were filed in the impeachment… would stand on their own," Gutierrez said.

Article III refers to the allegation that the Duterte must be impeached for committing bribery by giving monetary gifts or payments to Department of Education (DepEd) officials to induce the violation and circumvention of procurement and other related laws. — VDV, GMA News