Metro Manila, Philippines – The defense team of Vice President Sara Duterte will present a witness to support their claims that there is a plot to eliminate the second highest official and her family, her lawyer said on the fourth day of the impeachment trial on Monday, July 13.
“Yes your honor, that will be part of our evidence in chief,” Mark Vinluan, defense lawyer said, when asked by senator-judge Raffy Tulfo if Duterte’s camp intends to present a witness on the so-called ‘operation Romanov’ against Duterte.
In his statement before the court on July 8, Vinluan said though unconventional, Vinluan argued that the ‘kill’ remarks of the vice president against President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and his family is justified because of the alleged threats against her.
“Operation Romanov” is a reference to the execution of the Romanov royal family by the Bolsheviks in 1918 after Tsar Nicholas II was deposed during the Russian Revolution.
Vinluan said the defense cannot disclose their witness at this point.
He also noted that he has no personal knowledge if the supposed operation is linked to the statement of the vice president’s brother, Davao City Mayor Baste Duterte, who mentioned “Romanov” in a political forum in January 2024, in response to Tulfo’s question.
The younger Duterte then told Marcos to think of the “Romanovs” and what happened in 1986 so he can “maybe reconsider the direction” he is taking. The president’s father, the late dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos, was ousted from power in February 1986 through the EDSA People Power Revolution.
No validated info on threats
Testifying before the court, National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) regional director Jeremy Lotoc said their agency has not acquired any validated information on the supposed threats to Duterte’s life.
Lotoc handled the investigation on the alleged grave threats to the president as former chief of the NBI cybercrime division.
He shared that Duterte’s lawyer told the NBI then that they received information that there were threats to the vice president, prompting the agency to conduct its probe.
“Nag-conduct kami your honor ng open source. Wala kami na-validate sir, aside doon sa pag-aalis ng security personnel ng VPSPG and then nilipat sa Manila,” Lotoc said, when asked by Senator-judge Erwin Tulfo if they looked into the supposed threats.
[Translation: We conducted an open-source investigation, Your Honor. We were not able to validate anything, sir, aside from the removal of the vice president security and protection group (VPSPG) personnel and their reassignment to Manila.]
The NBI official said his team invited Duterte twice but the vice president skipped the summons and was only represented by counsel.
He explained that the purpose of the subpoena was to seek information from Duterte on the supposed threats against her.
However, during the direct examination of private prosecutor Amando Ligutan, Lotoc recalled a letter from the vice president in response to the summons ordering her appearance.
“Sinasabi doon we must state the obvious, the NBI is under the administrative supervision ng Secretary of Justice who is an alter ego of the president and the executive secretary is the chief of the ego so minarapat daw niya na makinig sa kanyang counsel at hindi na mag-appear sa subpoena ng NBI,” he said.
[Translation: It says there that we must state the obvious: the NBI is under the administrative supervision of the Secretary of Justice, who is an alter ego of the President, and the Executive Secretary is the chief of the [President’s] alter egos. Therefore, she deemed it proper to listen to her counsel and no longer appear in response to the NBI subpoena.]
