Senator-judge Raffy Tulfo asked a deceptively simple question during Vice President Sara Duterte’s impeachment trial: Why did no one in her legal orbit tell her to divest from her businesses before she took her oath?
It is an awkward question for another reason. Duterte is a lawyer. So is her husband, lawyer Manases Carpio, with whom she established a law firm.
Which leaves an uncomfortable menu of possibilities. Was it impunity? Negligence? A different reading of the law? Or simply a legal blind spot hiding in plain sight?
Whatever the answer, “Nobody told us” would be a curious defense in a household where law is supposed to be the family trade.
Article VII, Section 13 of the 1987 Constitution does not merely ask the President, Vice President, and other covered officials to avoid awkward conflicts. It prohibits them from participating in any business during their tenure and requires them to avoid conflicts of interest. Republic Act 6713 separately provides divestment rules when conflicts arise.
SEC records presented at the trial showed Duterte remained a director and 20 percent shareholder of Metro City Chow Foods Corp. during her vice presidency, with the board position continuing at least through 2025.
And here comes Tulfo’s Catch-22.
If a prohibited business interest was not disclosed, there could be a nondisclosure problem. If it was disclosed, disclosure does not magically transform a potentially prohibited interest into a permissible one. Divestment and actual participation remain separate questions.
Still, “Catch-22” is better rhetoric than settled constitutional doctrine. The Senate must determine whether ownership, board membership, or actual participation crosses the constitutional line. The SEC witness himself distinguished corporate records from proof of actual involvement in particular transactions.
That distinction matters.
But so does this: when two lawyers are involved, the question is not merely whether someone knew the law. It is whether anyone read the fine print before the oath.
Because sometimes the most expensive legal advice is the advice nobody gave.
