Ex-NBI chief ready to testify in VP impeach trial

MANILA, Philippines —  Former National Bureau of Investigation director Jaime Santiago, who oversaw the NBI probe into Vice President Sara Duterte’s alleged threats against President Marcos, the First Lady and former speaker Martin Romualdez, expressed willingness to testify before the Senate impeachment court.

“There is no subpoena, (but) it’s OK if I am subpoenaed!” Santiago told The STAR in a message yesterday.

Santiago led a six-member investigating panel in 2024 and 2025 to determine whether Duterte should be criminally charged for saying on Nov. 23, 2024 that she hired an assassin to kill the three if she herself got killed.

The threat is the subject of Article IV in the Articles of Impeachment being heard at the Senate.

The NBI filed complaints for grave threats and inciting to sedition against Duterte in February 2025 after the panel unanimously found her liable. The bureau’s complaint is still pending before the Department of Justice.

On Wednesday, defense lawyers for Duterte questioned gaps in the NBI’s probe during the cross-examination of senior NBI agent John Mark Calilung, who handled the case.

Asked about such gaps, Santiago opted to be mum: “I am listed as one of the witnesses at the impeachment. I will not speak for now about the investigation we made.”

The panel noticed that no affidavit of any of Duterte’s supposed targets was attached to the complaint, to which Calilung said the probe was initiated motu proprio.

But during his press conference in February 2025, the former NBI chief explained that the Vice President’s remarks were seditious since they “incited her followers to rise against the President.”

Meanwhile, law expert Ralph Sarmiento, vice chancellor for administration at the University of St. La Salle in Bacolod City, said Duterte’s defense team might be pulling off a “dangerous” move in insisting on considering the context of the threats she made.

Sarmiento said the defense would now be subjected to questions about “Operation Romanov,” the alleged project involving unauthorized surveillance operations against Duterte that exposed her and her family to security threats.

“It’s dangerous because once you bring up the issue of Operation Romanov… the senators can now ask about its context and what corroborative evidence the defense has to establish its existence,” Sarmiento told “Storycon” on One News yesterday.

Lawyer Domingo Cayosa, a constitutional law expert, said the impeachment trial should not be about grandstanding acts by either the prosecution and defense lawyers or the senator-judges.

Cayosa said the impeachment trial should reveal the truth, and prevent any delay or technicality. – Ghio Ong